Snapshots of the Past

Chinatown, New York City – Historic Print

Chinatown, New York City, 1909 — historic photograph
Chinatown, New York City, 1909. Historic photograph from the New York City collection.

(Originally scanned by the Library of Congress. Each image is professionally and digitally cleaned of artifacts such as color bars and extra borders prior to printing.)

Description

A window into the past: Chinatown, New York City, preserved in this historic photograph. The original is held by the Library of Congress, so what you hang is a true record of its time.

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Chinatown, New York City

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Taken in 1909, this view of Chinatown in New York City belongs to the George Grantham Bain Collection, a body of news photographs assembled by Bain during the early twentieth century. The caption card is tagged for religion, holidays, and Chinese in the United States, which suggests the picture was meant to show community life as well as the streets. By the 1900s, Chinese residents of Manhattan were concentrated in a few blocks around Mott and Pell streets, where merchants, family associations, and places of worship served a population shaped by restrictive federal immigration laws. Bain's images of such neighborhoods offer a useful record of how outside observers saw the district at the time.

Created / published1909
Medium1 photographic print.
GenrePhotographic prints 1900-1910.
NotesTitle and other information transcribed from caption card and item. George Grantham Bain Collection (Library of Congress). Caption card tracings: Religion; Geogr.; Holidays; Chinese in US.
SubjectsChinatown (New York, N.Y.)--1900-1910.
SourceLibrary of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division
Original scan1,029 × 1,536 px · prints to 3 × 5 in at 300 dpi
ReferenceAMZ-SOTP-HPA-145981

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