All I Wanted Was A Picture Of Snow

From the Bain News Service, “Snowstorm N.Y.”:

Nice. The Library of Congress website says it’s February 14, 1914, based on the 2/14114 written at the top. I believe I can prove that wrong. See the building with all the signage just to the left of the snowed-in streetcar? If you look very closely, and turn up the contrast, the arched sign and the one below clearly read AUTOMATIC VAUDEVILLE which, in addition to being a great album name for some band, is rather memorable.

The Automatic Vaudeville Company was an early step towards the formation of the movie industry and, importantly, was active only in 1903 and 1904. Their first storefront was at 48 East 14th Street, facing Union Square. Here it is in a 1904 map:

The map agrees nicely with what we’re seeing in the photo: the curved building at the corner of Broadway and 14th (right on the map, left in the photo) then the Automatic Vaudeville building, then the cast-iron front, then the wider stone-facade building. By 1930, 46 East 14th, the cast-iron building, had become Ohrbach’s department store:

By 1940, Ohrbach’s had swallowed 44 and 48 East 14th as well. Compare the cast iron facade at 46 and the stone facade (trimmed between the first photo and the second) at 44 to the top photo:

So what’s the thing on the right in the top photo? It’s not a building because that’s either Union Square proper or, more likely, the little orphaned triangle between Union Square, 14th Street, and Fourth Avenue. If you look close, it’s timber, and given the location it’s pretty much got to be subway construction. There were two main rounds here, 1901-1903, when the IRT built its first line under Fourth Avenue, and 1913-1916, when the BMT built the Broadway line. Here’s a 1911 map, after the IRT subway was complete and before work began on the BMT subway:

That’s the original IRT station in dashed orange at the lower right, next to the “MONUMENT”…right in that triangle and apparently right where the temporary construction was in the first photo. The BMT subway would be built a few years later on the west side of the square, to the left of the “Bloomingdale Road.” So the photo is from 1903 or 1904, when the Automatic Vaudeville Company was a going concern.

Any way…happy snow day.