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Mystery man in mystery house
By adamg on Mon, 04/06/2015 - 10:53am
The folks at the Boston City Archives wonder if you can place this photo. See it larger.
And we wonder if you can ID the guy who was hanging out the window when the photo was taken:
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Comments
Safety issues
Wow, imagine living like this today. Barbed wire, rocking horse on the fire escape (or rampway it is), trashy alleys. Boston inspectional services would have a hay day!
I guess you've never been to
I guess you've never been to Allston
That's Giuseppe calling out
That's Giuseppe calling out his brother Maurizio , telling him the pasta is ready!!!
This is the north end, Boston - post mollases tank explosion ,wooden building still up!!
This looks like circa 1927..
This looks like circa 1927..
This could be the area of Gove & Orleans St's East Boston just by looking at the wide street and the brick buildings in background.
This is definatly Orleans St East Boston.
Adam looks
good!
Ryan Seacrest?
Ryan Seacrest?
Clues galore hiding there...
Clues galore hiding there... Derelict gas lamp, but wires into the building (electricity?) Cobbled streets, retail on ground floor across the street. Wooden building attached to a brick building. West End, 1920s? I'll just posit Leonard Nimoy's dad as a young man.
I couldn't make out the sign
I couldn't make out the sign on the side of the building or anything on the glass or the door of the shop across the street.
Due to recent events, I was thinking of West End and Leonard Nimoy as well.
Jude Law?
!
Not sure where it was taken, but
pretty certain that's a young Jimmy Smits in the window.
Jack Lemmon?
But he had a privileged upbringing (Phillips Academy, Harvard). Staged photo?
Joe Kennedy
I'm going to guess it's JFK's father, Joseph P. Kennedy. Location: Somewhere in East Boston.
Norman B. Leventhal ?
Norman B. Leventhal, R.I.P.
Howard Johnson
He started from nothing and made a fortune.
Paul Revere Mall in the North End
Torn down as "slums".
John Fitzgerald
JFK's grandad, not dad. Since Rose was born in the North End in 1890 just before her dad was first elected to city council, I'm guessing the Noth End as location.
Salem St 1920's?
Salem St 1920's?
North Street, North End
Adam hasn't posted it yet, but the ArchivesBoston Twitter page has identified the answer as "the back of 316 North Street on 12/17/1930."
Courtesy of Ward Maps, here's a map of the area in 1928:
http://www.wardmaps.com/viewasset.php?aid=7230
A similar map from a few years later shows that the buildings in the foreground were all demolished in the early 1930s to make way for a ventilator building for the Sumner Tunnel:
http://www.wardmaps.com/viewasset.php?aid=4816
But the buildings in the background, on the far side of North Street, survive today. Here's a view from Google Maps:
http://goo.gl/maps/fhCyc
No word on who the guy in the window was.
The Answer!
Thanks for playing folks! This is the rear of 316 North Street on December 17, 1930. We don't know who the man in the window is, but we would love to find out!