The crowded streets of New York.

[texas1928]

Somethings never change.


I bet it was not as noisy as it is now.

[texanwitch]

1. I bet the streets were smelly with all the horses.

Great picture.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

2. That's exactly what I was thinking...

Imagine trying to cross the street in your nice white dress.

[Parche]

4. New York New York

Back then they were terrorized by Al-Coatas, British red forces
terrorizing the Americans

They used suicide horse and buggy bombs

[soleft]

But what street?

[smirkymonkey]

5. That's Fifth Avenue around the turn of the century (20th)

Most of those building are gone, but one or two of them still look familiar.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

3. Beautiful pic!

I wonder what's worse, exhaust fumes or stinky horse droppings left to bake in the sun?

[wildhorses]

6. ~

[Sanity Claws]

7. What is that woman doing?

Is she trying to yank her panties out of the crack? Or trying to hold onto her skirt so that it doesn't blow off to the side?

[wildhorses]

10. want i should ask her?

:shrug:

:rofl:

i have no idea :hi:

[Sanity Claws]

8. It must have been lower 5th Avenue and pre-subway.

Once the subways opened, people could live farther uptown and in the outer boroughs yet work in lower Manhattan. This alleviated the crush in lower Manhattan.
I just saw an exhibit at the New York Transit Museum on this. It was fascinating.

[texas1928]

11. I like history.

I am a history nerd.

[texanwitch]

9. Along with the smell, flies would have been a major problem.

I am guessing that men were paid to pickup what the horses left behind.

I love looking at old pictures like this.

[texas1928]

12. I like looking at the old pictures.

This is my home town in the past.

[HughBeaumont]

13. This picture reminds me of a book I recently read -

The Good Old Days: They were TERRIBLE by Otto Bettmann.

http://www.amazon.com/Good-Old-Days-They-Were-Terrible/dp/0394709411/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2/104-5558895-0614348?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1188320736&sr=8-2

In smaller towns, horses turned the street curbs and corners into cesspools with their wastes. In bigger cities, their dried shit was ground to a dust, which passersby usually had a nice sniff of if a wind came about.

Garbage and sanitation services were still in their infancy, so you can just imagine the stench there.

Same goes for traffic maintenance. Take a look at the photo; there aren't any traffic lights, so there's no real uniformity in the traffic or pedestrian flow. Streets in New York were like crowded and dangerous obstacle courses. Horsecars were filled to the walls with people; usually drunks, pickpockets and whores. The city usually reeked of sewage and old eggs.

Just a smidge of the horror stories of the "halcyon days of yore". As bad as New Yawk is, it could be an assload worse.

[texas1928]

14. There is always a dark side to everything.

I though really would rather put up with the smell of horse shit, than the smell of smog any day.

[HughBeaumont]

17. Funny you should mention that . . .

In a bigger city, you'd be getting BOTH.

The industrial-age, pre-EPA pollution, loaded with tons more cancerous elements not eliminated by today's safety standards, mixed with the effluvium of human and animal wastes and carcasses.

Vile.

[LSK]

15. check out this extremely long thread

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=34300

[texas1928]

16. Cool...

Thanks for the link.


:hi: