Destinations

Niagara Falls frozen over, 1911. This is the last year in which visitors were allowed to walk along the top of the frozen falls.


 

Downtown Los Angeles, 1886 and present day

 

This 1849 daguerreotype is the earliest datable photograph taken of the Alamo. It is the only known photo of the Alamo taken before the 1850 reconstruction, which added the distinctive curved gable to the top of the church facade. The second photo is a copy of the original daguerreotype, showing detail more clearly. The third photo is from 1858, showing the addition of the curved gable atop the church facade.

 

The Welcome Arch, also known as the Mizpah Arch, was built in 1906 to welcome passengers as they exited the Denver, Colorado train station upon their arrival into town.

The arch was wider than the length of a basketball court and contained around 200 lights. Denver Mayor Robert Speer, upon its completion, stated the arch “will stand for ages as an expression of love, good wishes and kind feelings of our citizens to the stranger who enters our gates.”
Originally, both sides of the arch read “WELCOME”, but the side people would see upon re-entering the train station to go home was changed to read “MIZPAH”, a Hebrew word expressing the emotional bond between people who are separated.

As the number of cars increased and vehicle sizes became larger, resulting in roads becoming more congested, the arch was seen as a traffic hazard and was torn down in 1931.

Below are images of the arch between 1906 and 1912.

    

 

City Hall Post Office was once an imposing structure in New York City, and despite its beautiful appearance, was not seen as such at the time it stood. In fact, it was disliked right from the start.

In 1857, President James Buchanan authorized Congress to purchase a site for a new post office in New York City. The city’s current post office was operating out of a small church that was nearly 200 years old.

A competition was held in which architects could submit their own design for a post office. If Congress approved of the design, that architect would get the job. One of those architects was Alfred B. Mullett. Congress did not like Mullett’s design, nor any of the other 51 designs submitted by other architects. Instead, Congress designed a post office of their own liking, modeled in the French Second Empire style. Architects did not like Congress’s design, feeling it was outdated. Mullett lobbied hard against their design in an attempt to persuade them to use his own. Instead, Congress shut the door on the matter and ended up hiring Mullett to build the antiquated French style post office they themselves had designed.

Construction began in 1867 and was completed in 1880. The first and second floors were used as a post office and for various postal departments such as mail sorting. Courtrooms and federal offices occupied the third and fourth floors.

No one liked the building. New York City residents felt it was outdated, as Mullett had expressed to Congress years earlier. The general feeling was that it was an eyesore in the city. The building became known as “Mullett’s Monstrosity”. Thirty-two years following its completion, in 1912, there were already plans for its demolition.

Mullett went on to design many other buildings throughout the country, but none as prominent (for the wrong reasons) as City Hall Post Office, a black mark to his name.
In 1890, dealing with failing health and financial troubles, Mullett took his own life in his Washington DC office. He was 56.

City Hall Post Office remained disliked. Plans to demolish it were still being discussed throughout the 1920s and 30s. It wasn’t until 1939 that it was demolished to make room for the New York World’s Fair that year.
With the passing of time and changing tastes, architects and the general public alike began appreciating the beauty of the once disliked (and now gone) building, considering City Hall Post Office one of Alfred B. Mullett’s greatest architectural achievements.
The images below consist of three views of City Hall Post Office from 1905 and a postcard from 1903.

 

On February 27, 1827, the first Mardi Gras took place in New Orleans. The original floats consisted of horse-drawn carriages carrying people in costume. The carriages were often accompanied by both young slaves and free African-American men, who carried torches to light the way for other carriages and bands during night parades. The celebration was loosely put together by citizens of the town. As a result, there was little organization and supervision.

In the 1850s, a rowdy crowd became violent during one celebration. In order to prevent violence from occurring in the future, a secret society called the “Mistick Krewe of Comus” took charge of the annual event, creating the first well-organized and large-scale Mardi Gras parade in 1857. It was the 1857 Mardi Gras which also introduced the first floats which didn’t consist of horse-drawn carriages.

In 1872, another organization, named Rex, began taking part in the celebration. They quickly became recognized as a major player in the parade, displaying some of the most elaborate floats of the time. Each year, one member of Rex was chosen to be the Monarch of that organization. With “Rex” meaning “King” in Latin, it meant the organization’s Monarch each year was “King of the Carnival”. That individual received the key to the city by the Mayor of New Orleans, a tradition which still takes place today.

Below are 19th and early 20th century Mardi Gras photos. Click here to see some of the many early Mardi Gras float designs. Click here to see some of the many 1873 Mardi Gras costume designs. (Note: These costumes are a product of their time and therefore some may not be politically correct by today’s standards).

 

Kitty Tatch, Katherine Hazelston, and Sadie Young were waitresses at Yosemite National Park hotels during the 1890s and early 20th century. The three loved posing for the park’s photographers more than 3,000 feet up on Overhanging Rock at Glacier Point. They would dance on the rock, getting as close to the edge as possible. The photographers would turn the pictures they took of the dancing ladies into best-selling postcards. Kitty Tatch would autograph the postcards she appeared on.
It is unknown which of the three women appear in the two photos below. The postcard pictures Sadie Young.

 

Comparison views of New York from 1874 and the present day

 

On August 15, 1901, the view of San Francisco Bay was forever changed with the explosion of Arch Rock, a hazardous landmark which had been the cause of numerous maritime disasters dating back to 1855.

Thirty-five men drilled 260 holes in the rock over a ten-month period before the holes were filled with explosives, blasting fragments of the rock up to a half mile away in all directions. Newspapers at the time reported that the explosion of Arch Rock was successful from an engineering standpoint, but from a visual standpoint was a failure. Those who witnessed the event expected to see massive waves created in the bay, but the blasting only resulted in a quick explosion (seen below) followed by calmness.

 

Comparison photos of Madison Square, New York, taken at the same location (1900 and present day)