It looks like the automobile age has barely arrived to this shabby but not chic corner at Hudson and Barrow Streets.
The photo dates to 1925, but notice the horse-drawn wagons and the store sign advertising harnesses across the street.
That’s P.S. 3 on the corner of Grove Street, with the flagpole on the mansard roof. And trolley tracks run up the center of the street, notes the caption to the photo, both published in 1976’s New York Then and Now.
The little Federal-style houses are long-gone by 1975, the year the second photo was taken, and a tall postwar apartment building looms in the distance.
P.S. 3 is still there, its flagpole moved to the front entrance. A deli and photography shop are the only businesses visible. Too bad the trolley tracks and the lovely bishop’s crook lampposts have disappeared.
Hudson Street at Barrow hasn’t changed much since 1975.
And though they’re out of view in the above photo, the Belgian blocks on Barrow still poke through the pavement opposite local dive Barrow Pub.
Tags: Barrow Street photo, Barrow Street West Village, horse-drawn wagons in the West Village, Hudson Street history, Hudson Street West Village, New York then and now, old photos Hudson Street, West Village in the 1920s
Ephemeral New York 
April 10, 2013 at 9:25 am |
Funny how the people today seem no different from those passing by almost 100 years ago. Sure, the clothes are looser, freer, almost skimpy, but what concerns do they have, historical preservation or just getting through the day in any way they can? Ah, progress…
April 10, 2013 at 3:22 pm |
Yes, I spent a long time looking very closely at the woman in the 1925 photo, trying to get some kind of clue about her. But she remains shrouded in mystery, captured accidentally in a moment of time.
April 11, 2013 at 1:13 pm |
Love those old lampposts! They give the street such a nice visual character.
April 12, 2013 at 2:13 am |
i lived in that building [72 Barrow Street] in 1975, it had [probably still has] a beautiful inner court yard and across the street was the Blue Mill Tavern and Cherry Lane Theater…. I witnessed many photo shoots where Commerce meets Barrow.
The Bill Baird puppet theater was down the block, and then there was Chumley’s @ Bedford Street- I used to look at St. Lukes in the Fields from my window….. ::sigh::
February 8, 2016 at 4:43 pm |
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