These stunning historical photographs show how New York City looked like in the 1880s. The images show the streets of NY, hustling crowds of Manhattan and the frolicking bathers of Coney Island. Men in the city are seen wearing suits and top hats, and women are wearing long dresses.
Wallace G. Levison captured these photographs in the late 19th century. He was a chemist and the founder of Departments of Mineralogy and Astronomy at Brooklyn Institute of Arts & Sciences in the latter half of the 19th century. He was also an avid photographer, using the new technology both as a scientific tool and a recreational activity.
Jumping became the height of fashion once it was invented in the 1880s.
That’s a lot of jumping.
Can we go to Fort Green and jump around as the people did back then
I came here to question that and am not surprised that’s the only comment here. Was jumping a way of stunting in photos back in the day?
Probably a good way to show off your gear’s fastest shutter speed at the time.
Can someone please explain the jumping on all these pics? Was jumping some kind of hobby back then?
How bad would it smell if I woke up in 1880 New York City?
In 1880, there were over 100,000 horses in New York City producing between 15 and 35 pounds of waste each. Wealthier residents could afford to have their refuse carted away, but entire neighborhoods were plagued by foul odors and waste overflow. This crisis peaked in the 1870s when an equine virus killed hundreds of horses daily, adding to the already noxious smells. The Department of Street Cleaning was formed in 1881 to combat this issue, and the rise in public health awareness and sanitation helped improve New Yorkers’ quality of life. The car’s popularity made many stables obsolete by 1920. Despite improvements, some areas of the city still have distinct smells, particularly in the summer and around horse-drawn carriages in Central Park.
Those 80ish years of living from the time the Brooklyn bridge was built (the first suspension bridge in the world, 1880s) to a man on the moon must have been wild
It reminds me of the quote about Miss Blankenship from Mad Men: “She was born in a barn in 1898.” She died on the thirty-seventh floor of a skyscraper. She’s an astronaut.”
Although people talk about how fast technology is moving today, and the ability to have everything in your pocket is amazing, I think it’s hard to argue it’s more revolutionary than if you lived from the 1880s to the 1960s or 1970s. Cars, jet planes, and spacecraft replaced horse-drawn carriages and steam trains. In the middle class, travel has been democratized from multi-day steam ships across the Atlantic to doing it in hours. Through telephones and fast communication, the world is becoming more interconnected. The fabric of one’s life in a city is literally transforming in a way that even NYC has not seen before.
Often, I try to envision myself in the context of the time, not knowing what was to come, and how today might or might not feel. It’s easy to think of today as the end of a line and history as a natural progression. We were coming out of a devastating war and pandemic a hundred years ago. People who lived through the Civil War were as close in time to those who lived through Vietnam then. Did people lose? Optimistic? Thankful? Desperate to survive? It’s time to visit the library again…
There are still places living in the past in the present, which is even more shocking. It’s amazing how quickly technology can change our lives
Humanity experienced the most dramatic transformation of the physical world during the 20th century.
During the 21st century, humans will have experienced the most dramatic transformation of the social fabric in history.
smoke, no smoke, smoke, no smoke