Author: Carl Johnson

A grand view of Albany’s Lincoln Park swimming pool. As the city grew, the old public baths proved insufficient to meet the need, and in the 1920s there were some short-term stabs at providing swimming facilities, including the Rocky Ledge wading pool and what appears to have been a swimming tank in Lincoln Park.…

On the one hand, this is such a common Albany view that we hardly think about it. On the other hand, who gets tired of looking at the Delaware and Hudson Railroad Building, the headquarters of what was once one of Albany’s great railroads? And on the third hand, it’s the D&H Building at…

Still mining the Tichnor Collection from digitalcommonwealth.org, with this lovely postcard view of the New York State Court of Appeals building on Eagle Street, just north of City Hall, across Pine Street. For those not familiar, this is the highest court in New York State’s court system (those imbued with common sense are usually…

This postcard view, likely from the 1930s or so like the others we’ve been showing, shows the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Albany, on Eagle Street at the southwest corner with Madison Avenue. While of course there is no Cultural Education Center towering over it from behind, there’s an amount of license in…

Another postcard from the Tichnor Collection at Digitalcommonwealth.org. “The Grand Staircase” is something of an understatement – this is the New York State Capitol’s Great Western Staircase, also (and probably better) known as The Million Dollar Staircase. But, of course, it cost much more than that, at an estimated $1.5 million. With 444 steps…

This postcard from the Tichnor Collection shows what was once known as the “new” post office in downtown Albany. According to the Federal General Services Administration, a new post office was first authorized in 1930 with a $3.325 million allocation “to purchase a site and construct a new federal building in Albany, New York,…

This postcard, also from the Tichnor Collection at Digitalcommonwealth.org, depicts what was then called the Flag Room of the New York State Capitol in Albany. Even when this postcard was made, it doesn’t appear that battle flags were on display here … they may have already been moved out into the eastern entry hall …

We’re not sure of the date of this postcard, probably somewhere in the 1930s, but what’s interesting is how little has changed. The Plaza in the immediate foreground no longer extends State Street around the area where buses and trolleys congregated, and the Hotel Ten Eyck, the tall building halfway up the hill on…

Hoxsie’s going to show you some pretty pictures for a little while. We came across a huge trove of local picture postcards from the Tichnor Collection at Digitalcommonwealth.org, a Bay State resource that knows no borders, apparently. This is a lovely print of the “new” Dunn Memorial Bridge connecting Albany and Rensselaer, in its…

How did Albany celebrate the nation’s centennial in 1876? With firemen’s shirts, white cotton military gloves, and blue flannel regatta shirts. With three-foot long flags. With centennial illuminators – perfectly safe to use, and beautiful in effect.