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You could always count on those Kennedy boys for some fresh, uniform butter
By adamg on Mon, 10/23/2017 - 11:46am
The folks at the Boston City Archives wonder if you can place this scene. See it larger.
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Comments
JP
Centre st JP
That object on the road looks
That object on the road looks like nothing so much as a discarded carryout coffee cup. But I feel like that's probably not what it is...
Time traveler!
Time traveler!
That alleyway
That alleyway between the buildings is practically identical to the Wareham St. sidewalk pictured in the Citizen Complaint post below.
"Uniform butter"
"Every butter maker ... knows that higher prices will be paid for a car load or two of butter that is uniform in quality"
https://books.google.com/books?id=eyNJAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA3-PA42&lpg=RA3-PA42&...
It seems to have been a thing in the 1920s.
JP
668 Centre St. I'm guessing it's February 1907.
Good guess, but...
I doubt it's that -the alleyway in the photo goes up an incline. The area behind 668 Centre is either flat or downhill. Also, it looks like that there's a bay window above the door to the right of Kennedy Butter and Eggs, which doesn't exist on the present building. If I had to guess, I'd say that this may be somewhere along Huntington Ave or Tremont St in Mission Hill...
Sure...but...
Kennedy & Co. was located at 668 Centre St.
They were indeed
From about 1968 to 1999. It was also a chain with several other locations. Side note: are those two of the Triplets of Belleville window shopping?
Edge of a hill
Trolley tracks. Guess would be somewhere along the Mission Park area of Huntington St., between Brigham Circle and Heath, or Tremont street in the same neighborhood.
Neat picture
Love these. Thank you for posting them.
Wasn't this on Centre Street in Jamaica Plain
until just a few years ago?
668 Centre Street Jamaica
668 Centre Street Jamaica Plain
I don't think so...
I just walked down that alley last week and it's not inclined like the photo.
Sorry, it appears so.
http://www.jamaicaplainnews.com/2015/01/29/own-a-slice-of-jp-history-ken...
Landscapes can change over time.
Different sign
Landscapes don't change that much ... I doubt they tore down the hill and buildings behind.
Perhaps they moved from somewhere else? Pushed out by the VA ?
Perhaps.
Although they could of. Look at what happened to the hills of Boston.
Signs do change over time.
I do think it is a JP institution, though.
More than one?
It was apparently a chain at one point. The Jamaica Plain Historical Society page says that this location opened in the 1960s.
Makes sense.
n/t
Must be a different location
A caption on a photo in the JP News article you cite states that they'd been at the 668 Centre Street location for 32 years when it closed in 2000. The picture we're trying to identify seems to be from an era much earlier than 1968.
Kennedy's was a chain
Kennedy & Co. was a chain - I remember a branch in my neighborhood in Allston when I was growing up, and I remember stumbling upon one up in Salem, maybe some time in the 1980s or 90s.
that article says it was at
that article says it was at 668 Centre Street for 32 years before closing in '99. That means it moved there in 1967. So it was in a different JP location before? The mystery deepens.....
That said, generally speaking a grade change like that would be believable.... once cars become a thing the owners want to flatten the site to create parking in the back, so they install a retaining wall at the rear property line (ala Colburn Street at the foot of Mission Hill near the Huntington turn).
BUT as for 668 Centre there is no hill behind it to be terraced.
I'll see you 366 Centre
And raise you 362 Centre. Their older address.
I don't know why, but I just think it's Centre Street.
That sign is now hanging
inside the Galway House.
Main Street Charlestown
Could be so many places, those Kennedy stores were all over the place.
668 Centre St. JP
butter store closed in 1999
Opened in 1967
http://www.jphs.org/photogallery/1970s-and-1980s-jamaica-plain-photos/13...
Please use in a sentence.
Please use in a sentence.
The old pro knew he was going to have to improve his off-season conditioning program.
Each February, come "pitchers and catchers report", it was taking more and more uniform butter to get into his uniform.
Well-played
Thank yew!
Thank yew!
https://i.imgur.com/Lhd1nD4.gif
Kennedy & Co.
I first moved to Boston in 1969 and have lived in several neighborhoods since then, so I remember several Kennedy & Co. locations: In addition to Centre Street, I also remember one on Harvard Street in Coolidge Corner (possibly where Zaftigs is now or in an adjacent building) and on Dot Ave. in Fields Corner. But I don't recall an alley beside any of them that had an alley next to it that went up a small rise...
Kennedy's was a major chain
They routinely took out full page ads in the Globe
https://i.imgur.com/5VW9avV.png
There seems to be one Kennedy's remaining - in Lowell
https://www.google.com/maps/place/13+Merrimack+St,+Lowell,+MA+01852/
1317 Tremont
I googled "tremont kennedy butter" and low and behold: Kennedy & Co. 1317 Tremont
This was the 1921 directory, so this picture was probably taken during the 1920s.
Here's the location now (Likely wiped out for the SW Corridor).
So Whyaduck may be right about massive changes in landscape.
There are other locations listed ... Three in Washington Street alone, one on Blue Hill Ave, Dorchester Ave, etc.
I agree,
I think the guy on the left is standing on the address numbers, and it looks like four digits with "1" in the first and third position.
Looking again at the enlarged
Looking again at the enlarged photo, I see something else that might narrow down the location...
In the right-hand window, there's a reflection - must be an awning or sign across the street -
Henry's
Does that make sense in the context of any of those addresses and directories?
Long list of locations
Looks like Kennedy Butter and Egg had a long list of locations by 1921.
Many of these streets have "hill" in the name, like Blue Hill and Bunker Hill. Bowdoin St. was also a hill.
Give it a whirl.
Jamaica Plain
Jamaica Plain
Also in Roslindale
There was a Kennedys in Roslindale Sq on Corinth Street when i was a kid in the 60s. They had various grades of butter. Some were a dark yellow and some almost white. They also ground coffee there and would blend it to your specifications.
Walking in there or even by the open door was a whiff of coffee that one cannot forget.
They were next to Clausen's German Deli.
The Answer
Thanks for playing, folks!
This photo was taken on April 26, 1932. It shows the Kennedys Store on Main Street in Charlestown. The photo is labeled 'Opposite 186 Main Street"
An astonishing coincidence
That the Charlestown photo should have such a close resemblance to the later JP location: same recessed doorway, with an alley to the left, and even a downspout in almost exactly the same location!
This seems to be the same building today: https://www.google.com/maps/place/186+Main+St,+Boston,+MA+02129/@42.37597,-71.0650444,3a,15y,49.03h,91.03t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1soJz0_lX4wlSmihUntMBn-w!2e0!5s20110801T000000!7i13312!8i6656!4m5!3m4!1s0x89e370ec3795d9a9:0xe328d73444bd4376!8m2!3d42.3761648!4d-71.0652932.
The correct answer is: