Boston & Cambridge - 1950's

[briv]

What's now called the 'Newbry' was built as the New England Life Insurance Company building. It replaced MIT after that institution moved to Cambridge.

Here's what it looked like before it took on its current form:

 

[czsz]

Check out the gasometer in the background at Kendall Sq. They could have done something cool with it a la Vienna. Or, if not, it wouldn't have been substantially worse than what's there now.

 

[vanshnookenraggen]

If it had more crazy statues and details that would be down right Stalinist.

 

[kz1000ps]

I never understood what Ralph Adams Cram was going for with the original incarnation of that building until seeing the above rendering. From that angle, and that angle only, it makes (made) sense. Still, it's a most odd way to fill out two-thirds of a block.

Makes me think of what poet David McCord said about the building when it was new:

Ralph Adams Cram
One morning said damn,
And designed the Urn Burial
For a concern actuarial.

 

[vanshnookenraggen]

Ralph Adams Cram
One morning said damn,
And designed the Urn Burial
For a concern actuarial.

Fucking awesome.

 

[Lurker]

Cram was known for having an obtuse sense of humor and writing lovecraftian short stories.

He designed the original building for a life insurance company and thought it was hilarious to add large funerary urns into the design without the client picking up on the significance.

This was around the time he was working on the Boston Federal Building, now the John W. in Post Office Square, so the similarities between the two buildings are apparent.

 

[Ron Newman]

I don't see the urns in either the drawing or the photo. Where are they?

 

[Beton Brut]

The finials on the tower's corners are certainly urn-like.

 

[JohnAKeith]

Several from the MIT Libraries flickr stream.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mit-libraries/show/

Above, Plymouth Theater & row of buildings on Stuart Street, currently site of State Transportation building

Inside South Station, I guess?

South Station

Toward Kenmore Square, pre-CITGO

Charles Street Station

An amazing photo; Ritz-Carlton in the background, 31 St James St in the foreground.

Somewhere in Boston or Cambridge - Yep, you can get milk 24-hours a day ...

 

[Ron Newman]

Below the CITIES SERVICE sign it says something like KOOL MOTOR -- I guess the building under the sign was a car dealer.

 

[briv]

What a space.

 

[czsz]

What is that milk thing...some kind of refrigerated indoor vending machine?

Also, why does the city seem so empty in so many of these shots?

 

[found5dollar]

^ because exposure times had to be much longer back then. people walking gets blurred out.

 

[Ron Newman]

but the photos inside South Station show people standing.

 

[PaulC]

but the photos inside South Station show people standing.

But they are standing still and in one the guy looking at the dispalay is starting to fade. The other people are blury

 

[piggiston]

Long exposure times required? This is the 1950s, not the 1850s! The fading man inside South Station is clearly just suffering a Back to the Future kind of effect.

 

[kz1000ps]

It took several days, but I've finally finished going through the MIT archive's photostream, and holy crap was it worth it. Now for the interesting stuff:

Chinatown/NEMC area:

Scollay Square:

Gotta love black & white night photos.... where was this building? EDIT: right across the street from Fanieul Hall, where 28 State now sits.

Artery Noir

These next few are of the area by Berklee, before the highway came along and ripped out dozens upon dozens of buildings along Boylston Street. I've been looking for shots of this area for years.

The first two are of Boylston and Mass looking east

And this is of Mass and Newbury...note how there's buildings to the far right (where there's now an onramp for the turnpike)

MIT's game was a step above the rest

BU, not so much. This is by BU central, taken from the BU Bridge

Comm Ave at the BU Bridge

And this is the block bounded by Comm Ave, Bay State Rd, Deerfield Rd and Silber Way...the Towers dorms now occupy the vacant lot in the foreground (amazing this land sat fallow for half a century)

 

[czsz]

Looks like the cars already owned the city by that time.

Scollay Square looks like it was already half-hollowed out for parking even before Gov't Center was cleared out.

 

[jass]

If the lot in the last one is the BU towers, than behind it is the school of management, and to the left, the howard johnson motel.

 

[BostonUrbEx]

Not gonna lie, Cambridge St (not necessarily the buildings, but the street itself) is so much better in the present day. It's awful in those pictures, and I thought it was terribly wide as it is now...