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Robert Ripps book
History of Tribeca Buildings
Tribeca in the 1940s
“The New York City Municipal Archives just added the 1940s tax photos to its photo database,” emailed Peter. “I’ve spent hours wandering down long lost sections of Washington, Duane, Reade…. Lots of great photos under the elevated line on Greenwich. Super cool. Take a look.” The tax survey photos from the 1980s (a few are here and here) have been online for a couple of years—there’s a neat map at 80snyc.com—but this is the first time we’ve been able to browse the 1940s ones. They are indeed spectacular. I didn’t quite choose the ten below at random, but it was close; click on just about anything and you’ll find it interesting. And each photo page has a link to buy a print.
The interface isn’t the best part. (Here’s hoping the 80snyc folks will do one for the 1940s photos.) The main page for Manhattan is here, and if you click on the “category pages” box, you’ll get a list of street names. I haven’t tried to verify whether the Department of Taxation’s street addresses match today’s.
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9 Comments
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i remember how sad i was when they tore down the marine midland bank building to build the smyth hotel. the interior was spectacular. thanks for posting these!
Thank you for the photos. Fascinating. So much more beautiful (and apparently much cleaner) then than now.
Is there a way to save photos from the database?
You could save them on Pinterest. If you don’t have an account, it’s easy to open one!
Except for Beach Street, which is virtually unchanged, most show scenes and buildings (and even streets) that do not still exist. Admittedly these images were hand picked, but it does show how much physical change is possible in 70+ year- about an average lifetime.
If large portions of Tribeca were not granted landmark status, think how many more of these buildings & history would have been lost in the past 15 or so years. And look around at all the beautiful & significant buildings that currently fall outside of the landmarked areas, because sandly many of them will be gone in the next 15 years…
It is interesting to compare these 1940s tax photos to the 1980s/1990s mystery photos recently featured on this site. The rate of change has really accelerated.
where is 47 Franklin today? is it 50 Franklin today? I think thats the current NYU dorm building next to it
47 Franklin Street today would be the side of the Family Court building.
Re: Safe as Milk’s comment above — Before the bank building was so sadly demolished I wrote a letter to the Tribeca Trib saying I thought any clever architect might incorporate it as the base for a hotel that would rise above it. What a priceless, unique lobby there might have been, aside from other related architectural amenities! But no. Really imaginative developers are virtually nonexistent.