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The dirt roads of old Boston

Old unpaved street in old Boston

The folks at the Boston City Archives wonder if you can place this scene. See it larger.


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Comments

Is my less than educated, not even researched guess.

That castle-like house looks SO familiar, but I don't think it's on Corey.

How about this (Hastings St, also West Rox)? The yellow castle house looks right, but none of the other houses really do.

https://goo.gl/maps/BH64bQvjWsB2

Sure looks like Hastings Street or perhaps Park or Richwood Street next to it, on the northern side of Centre St in West Roxbury.

Here's a view that I think has the first houses on the right: .

And here's the Victorian down the road:

Too many trees to get the same view today!

It look so familiar!

Looks like a few of the streets in the vicinity of Fallon Field quite possibly South Street.

If so, that section of South Street ,leading up to the Holy Name give or take , was known as ''Doctor's Row ".......

No guess here but I remember seeing an old B&W photo of my grandmother standing in front of the old homestead in the 500 block of Hyde Park Ave, camera facing Forest Hills/JP and Hyde park Ave was a wide dirt road. This was taken around WW-I or just after. That will give you an idea of just how built up the area and city has become in time. Let's remember that "The Grove" section of West Roxbury was a set of summer cottages where the downtown crowd vacationed to get away from the city.

I didn't move to the city
the city moved to me
and I want out desperately

looks a lot like Hastings Street in West Roxbury - that Queen Ann Victorian on the right side looks identical and the homes on both sides look the same too

or someone making the effort to claim to be him claims it, I'm moving my guess one street over.

The picture makes me think of streets in the area between Fields Corner and Codman Square - maybe Melville Av or Upland Av.

after studying it carefully, it's not Upland and I cant place the houses on Melville either.

There aren't a lot of long straight residential streets in Boston, so here's my guess.

Fairview Street, or Congreve Street, off South Street, near Fallon Field

My guess is Ashmont Hill

Off of Market Street in Brighton

lovely street.

Thanks for playing, folks! Those of you who guessed West Roxbury are correct. This is Park Street, west of Centre Street. The photo was undated, but was found with a group of similar photographs of West Roxbury, all taken about 1885. That seems to match with the clothing, so we're saying, circa 1885-1900.

bucolic and the trees look so young and small!

The Google view from this same spot is mostly just trees, but here's a close-up of the cylindrical "castle" house on Park St.

https://goo.gl/maps/iMkbBVsvPdM2

The only thing I could possibly have guessed was that it was probably taken on a Sunday.

This kind of reminds me of a summer cottage our family shared with extended family down on the cape many decades ago. Loved the old dirt roads!

Also looks like Fuller Street in Dorchester, Ma

It’s hard to imagine that there was ever a time when the roads of Boston were made of dirt! Boston is such a thriving city that it’s difficult to picture what it used to look like. Thankfully, the city is always moving forward and welcomes change while also being proud of its history.