In this atmospheric shot, we’re looking north up Spring St toward 3rd St in downtown Los Angeles. The year was 1907, when the streets of LA were still being shared by horses with carriage and those new-fangled horseless carriages. This is one of those photos where I can practically hear the clang of the streetcar, the wail of the klaxon, and the clip-clop of the horses. I also love seeing those 5-lamp streetlights.
This is how that same intersection looked in January 2023. Unfortunately that building with the turret on the right is gone but the building opposite it that we can just see in the vintage photo is still with us, so that’s something.
Do you know what the building was that’s at the very far end of the street, where the street appears to dead end at that building?
I noticed that building and wondered about it, too, but I can’t ID it.
Hamburgers Department Store before they moved. The big signage on the roofs is hard to spot from Third. The street just angled from 1st on a curve which makes it look like a dead end. I believe the surviving building on the left corner was the Southern Pacific ticket agency on the ground floor before they shifted locations outward too.