This is an early version of the Type F reverse-scroll NYC streetlamp at Elm and Pearl Streets in, I’d say, 1910 or so. The Type F was used on side streets in a smaller version with less ornamentation, and could sometimes be used on north-south avenues like 7th (though it was replaced by Twinlamps fairly early on there).
NYC has returned to larger versions of the Type F and installed them on East and West 8th Street in Greenwich Village and Wyckoff Avenue in Bushwick, Brooklyn, though they’re sparingly used.
Another interesting aspect of this photo is that this corner no longer exists, as it is now smack in the middle of the heavily guarded Jacob K. Javits Federal Office Building and Court of International Trade, which went up in the 1970s. Elm Street itself no longer exists: the southern portion became Elk Street, while the northern end became Lafayette.
And that’s not all: the subway entrance kiosk in the distance allowed entrance to the Worth Street station on the Lex IRT, which was closed in 1962.
The buildings in the left advertise printing supplies and typewriter ribbons.
It is an ever-changing city.
11/26/12
5 comments
Correction: the Worth Street Station was closed in 1962.
The Worth St IRT station closed in 1962 with the expansion of the Brooklyn Bridge station. At first the expanded station was called Brooklyn Bridge-Worth St. The kiosk was gone before then (though a few other IRT were still extant in 1962). I remember, hopefully correctly, that there was entrance to the Worth St station through the Board of Health building on Foley Sq at the NE corner of Worth & Lafayette, probably from the 1920s.
Fred, you are correct about the entrance to Worth Street at the northeast corner of Worth and Lafayette. My father pointed that out to me when I was a kid, and he remembered using it.
Do you mean the kiosk or the station was closed in the 1940’s? The station remained open much longer.
Correct–the station closed in 1962, but those kiosks were gone for the most part before that.