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Progress view, Cambridge Bridge

Collection Type

  • Photography

Date

1911-11-03

Location Note

Folder 27

GUSN

GUSN-260148

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Description

A view of workers laying the tracks on the Longfellow Bridge, looking toward the West End and Beacon Hill. Horse carts carry loads to and from Boston across the bridge. The workers, with their full wheelbarrows and shovels, can be seen in the foreground. Massachusetts General Hospital is in the upper left corner. The Longfellow Bridge was completed for street traffic in 1906, six years before any train would cross it. The workers here are seen finishing up the tracks in November 1911, just a few months before the opening of Boston's Red Line subway.

The Red Line turned 100 years old on March 23, 2012. When the line opened in 1912, it was called the Cambridge Main Street Subway. The line went from Park Street Station to Harvard Square in just eight minutes. It is estimated that 204,000 people rode the new subway on its first day.

Details

Descriptive Terms

subways
tracks (transit system elements)
bridges (built works)
rivers
hospitals (buildings for health facility)
horse-drawn vehicles
workers
shovels
wheelbarrows
photographs
black-and-white photographs

Physical Description

1 black and white photograph

Collection Code

PC017

Collection Name

Boston Transit Archive, 1895-1960s

Reference Code

PC017.02.027.001

Image Dimensions

7.75 x 9.75 (HxW)(inches)

Places

Boston (Suffolk county, Massachusetts)
Charles (Massachusetts) [river]

Record Details

Material Type

photographs
black-and-white photographs

Subjects

West End (Boston, Mass.)

Description Level

Item

Location Note

Folder 27

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