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Time was, Bostonians could buy rifles, pistols and fishing tackle at the same place
By adamg on Tue, 02/16/2016 - 11:29am
The folks at the Boston City Archives wonder if you can place this scene. See it larger.
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Adams Square, c. 1895
Adams Square at the bottom of Cornhill (left) and Brattle Street (right). Electric streetcar overhead is visible (making it no earlier than 1890), and perhaps that is preliminary subway construction going on. 1895?
Woolworths downtown was like
Woolworths downtown was like that well into the 1980s.
Roaches in Cambridge did until about 10 years ago when they closed.
Can't remember if B&M in Hyde Park sold fishing supplies in addition to their pet supply selection prior to being forced out of business by Menino.
From bohhh's clue
HEY!
Don't give my post more thumbs-ups than bohhh's.
bass pro shop?
is that the first store?
Sounds more like an early
Wal-Mart to me.
but
Bass Pro sells all of that stuff.
DTX had the largest Woolworths in the world
they had a sports department on the 3rd floor that had a hunting section that sold shotguns, other firearms,ammo, knives, BB and pellet guns. Used to buy my fish there as a kid, took them home on the train in a baggy. All ended in the late 80s, early 90s.
Ended in 1989:
Ended in 1989:
-City Council passed a an AWB ban which has yet to be enforced.
-Shut down the BPS rifle teams.
-Harassed the collegiate and parochial school teams in the city into shutting down.
-Started restricting LTCs issued to non doctors/lawyers/special people.
-Harassed the Boston Gun & Rifle Association (until the club pointed out they are on state land and have other legal protections)
-Started a systematic campaign to shut down every FFL dealer within the city limits including Woolworths.
All Woolworth's in USA closed by 1997
Half of them closed in 1993:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F._W._Woolworth_Company#Decline
Downtown Crossing Woolworth's
The Woolworth's on Washington Street, at Franklin, was the largest in the world when it opened. I've heard that a larger one opened later in England somewhere.
It was one of the last stores in the chain to operate. I was passing by on their last day in business in 1997 and walked in to see if I could buy a souvenir. It was pretty sad, there was nothing left that anyone would want, even as a memory of a once-great chain. I left empty-handed.
Nanci Griffith wrote a song about the Woolworth's in Austin, Texas, and in her live recording of the song she does a wonderful intro about how all the Woolworth's in the world looked and smelled the same. She was right.
A little-known fact: The building on Washington Street in Boston was intended to be the new home of Raymond's, a local cut-price department store that had been on that site for many decades. The BRA took their building in the 1960s and promised Raymond's that they could move back into the new building when it was completed. Raymond's then moved, supposedly temporarily, to a site south of Jordan Marsh where Lafayette Place would later be built. But Raymond's didn't last; they went out of business before the new store was ready. The developers of that building then had to find a new tenant, and ended up with Woolworth's.
The BRA took the old Raymond's building, in large part, to realign Franklin Street so that it connected directly with Bromfield Street, instead of the traffic having to make a jog.
The Answer
Thanks for playing, folks! This is Adams Square, showing Brattle Street. The date is April 13, 1897.