Collection from the Sesquicentennial Exposition of 1926 Added to PhillyHistory.org
Liberty Bell, Entrance Gate (1925 or 1926).
PhillyHistory.org is proud to announce the addition of a new collection of photographs depicting the Sesquicentennial Exposition! In 1926, Philadelphia celebrated the 150th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence by hosting a six-month long world's fair known as the Sesqui-Centennial International Exposition. Featuring a newly constructed stadium, a re-creation of a Philadelphia street in 1776, an 80-foot tall reproduction of the Liberty Bell covered in 26,000 lights, and exhibits from around the world, the Sesquicentennial was visited by over 6,400,000 people from its opening on May 31, 1926 until its closing on November 30, 1926. Although various issues including poor weather, lower than expected attendance, and high construction costs prevented the Sesquicentennial from being a financial success, the events of the Exposition and the visitors it brought to Philadelphia are a truly significant part of the City's history.
The Philadelphia
City Archives hold a collection of photographic prints taken before
and during the Sesquicentennial. For decades, these prints remained pasted
into large scrapbooks where they faced deterioration due to acidic paper
and chemicals in the scrapbook glue. Several years ago, archivists carefully
removed the prints from the scrapbooks and placed them into archival quality
enclosures and boxes. The process of preserving these beautiful images
now continues as they are digitized and made available on PhillyHistory.org
for the world to see, sometimes for the first time ever. We are excited
to have already scanned 2,300 Sesquicentennial images. To find them on
PhillyHistory.org, select the 'DOR Archives - Sesquicentennial'
collection under the'Collections' pull down menu. Visit PhillyHistory.org
often as new photos are added each week!
Entrance Gates with Crowds, June 27, 1926.
If you want to see President
Calvin Coolidge addressing the crowd, the Treasure
Island amusement, or the 1926
version of a party car, head over to www.phillyhistory.org
to browse the brand new Sesquicentennial photograph collection. Have fun
checking out how Philadelphia throws a 150th birthday party!
7,357
Images scanned in the last 3 months
71,282
Total maps and photos scanned and available online
59,651
Unique Visitors in the last 3 months
The Philadelphia City Archives are one of the country's
largest municipal archives, with an estimated 2 million photographs that
date from the late 1800’s. These gorgeous pictures paint a stunning
portrait of Philadelphia and its industry, architecture, culture and people.
NewAddictive PhillyHistory Features
Another newsletter and another batch of new features. We love keeping you addicted to PhillyHistory.org!At PhillyHistory, we love maps! Who doesn't like to see exactly where a specific photo was taken? Now we've added a map to the 'Add to Favorites' feature so that you can see exactly where the photos you added in your 'Favorites' are located in Philadelphia. If you have a PhillyHistory.org account, just click on the 'Add to Favorites' button located in the detail view of each photo to add it to list of your list of favorite photographs.
With photos of everything from an 80-foot tall
Liberty Bell to a rodeo, the Sesquicentennial collection shows a very
unique part of Philly's history. Now the photos from the Sesquicentennial
are easy to locate. Simply click on the 'Collections'
pull down menu and uncheck all the boxes except the one for
DOR Archives- Sesquicentennial. Then hit search and enjoy the photos!
We love making the search options on PhillyHistory.org as helpful
as possible. If you've just performed a particular search, you may want
to remember that search in the future or even copy those search parameters
to send to a friend. Now both options are easy to do using the new
'Recent Searches' menu. Click on 'Recent
Searches', located right above the photo thumbnails, to perform a recent
search again or copy that search information. Just one more way to find
the perfect photograph on PhillyHistory.org!
For those of you who have been using these features, we’d love to hear
how they have improved your experience on PhillyHistory.org and
if you have any suggestions for future changes. Let us know at info@phillyhistory.org
This message was sent to you as an enrolled user of www.phillyhistory.org, the City of Philadelphia Department of Records web-based photographic collection. To subscribe to this list, e-mail info@phillyhistory.org with the subject 'subscribe'
PhillyHistory.org Collaborates with EveryBlock to Make its Collection Even More Widely Accessible
Thanks to a new partnership with EveryBlock.com there is yet another way to find and enjoy the amazing historic photographs on PhillyHistory.org. EveryBlock.com was launched last year with support from a grant from the Knight Foundation. The site filters an assortment of local news by location so you can keep track of what’s happening on your block, in your neighborhood and all over your city. The site is currently available in 9 U.S. cities. The Philadelphia version, EveryBlock Philadelphia provides a huge array of civic information on Philly including newspaper articles, crime reports, restaurant inspections, event calendars and Craigslist postings. Much like PhillyHistory.org, EveryBlock's online application enables you to enter an address or neighborhood to find specific recent news for that part of Philadelphia. It's a great way to know exactly what's going on in your part of the city.
Recognizing that the history of a city can be just as interesting as present-day information, EveryBlock has worked with PhillyHistory.org to include historic images of Philadelphia on their website. Located under the "Historical images" menu, these photos from PhillyHistory.org are fully searchable by zip code, city council district, and various other categories. If you want to find out more about an image, just click on the thumbnail of the photo to head over to PhillyHistory.org and learn more about the photographic history of the city.
The Philadelphia Department of Records Is Awarded a Prestigious Grant from NEH and IMLS for PhillyHistory.org
PhillyHistory.org is excited to announce that the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) awarded the City of Philadelphia, Department of Records a grant in August 2008 as part of the Advancing Knowledge: The IMLS/NEH Digital Partnership grant program. In collaboration with the Free Library of Philadelphia, the Department of Records will use the $108,882 grant over the next two years to make historically significant collections from the Free Library available on PhillyHistory.org, further develop the website and provide geospatial data back to the Free Library. The Philadelphia Department of Records is one of only four recipients nationally to receive this grant in 2008.
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The Institute of Museum and Library Services is the primary source of federal support for the nation's 122,000 libraries and 17,500 museums. The Institute's mission is to create strong libraries and museums that connect people to information and ideas. The Institute works at the national level and in coordination with state and local organizations to sustain heritage, culture, and knowledge; enhance learning and innovation; and support professional development.
Created in 1965 as an independent federal agency, the National Endowment for the Humanities supports learning in history, literature, philosophy, and other areas of the humanities. NEH grants enrich classroom learning, create and preserve knowledge, and bring ideas to life through public television, radio, new technologies, museum exhibitions, and programs in libraries and other community places.
A huge thank you to NEH and IMLS for helping us with the work of digitizing Philadelphia's past! Check back to PhillyHistory.org often as we add new images and continue to preserve the visual history of the City one photograph at a time.
Interact with PhillyHistory.org's Collection! Do You See an Error? Submit an Error Report in Just a Few Clicks
We'd love to think that the information associated with each photograph in the PhillyHistory.org database is perfect. However, we have to admit that occasionally the data we have just doesn't seem to match the subject of the photograph. Whether it is an address that looks a bit off or a date that does not make sense with the year of the car in the photo, we sometimes need assistance to make sure PhillyHistory.org is as accurate as possible.
How do the errors get in the system in the first place? Sometimes it's simply a lack of data. A negative's envelope may be labeled "Various Houses on Pine Street" but not list individual addresses. Other photos might all be listed as taken at the intersection of 8th Street and Fairmount Avenue when actually the photographer took the first photo there but then proceeded to take additional photos in the surrounding blocks.
For example, the above photograph is of the 400 and 500 Blocks of N. Franklin Street. Unfortunately, this is all the information we have.
Whatever the reason, the best way
to make the website as accurate as possible is to use the incredible knowledge
of PhillyHistory users! Residents of neighborhoods all over Philadelphia
and from towns across the country visit PhillyHistory.org on a daily basis. If you are one of those visitors and you see an error,
let us know! Just click on the 'See an Error? Submit an Error Report'
button located above each photograph to send a message straight to the PhillyHistory staff working at the archives. Together, we can make
sure that these photographs provide everyone with a helpful history of
Philadelphia.
And remember... as a user with an account, you can also share PhillyHistory.org's
images with friends, purchase copies, add them to your list of "favorites",
and create bookmarked searches that get updated each time a new image
is added within your search criteria.
Your Neighborhood in Photographs:
Packer Park
When Sesquicentennial organizers chose
to build the Exposition grounds near the Navy Yard and League Island Park
(now FDR Park), they brought attention to an area of South Philly that
had not yet been fully developed into residential housing. In the following
decades, housing construction in this area would dramatically increase.
This month's "Your Neighborhood in Photographs" highlights Packer Park,
a neighborhood that was the location of the Sesquicentennial celebration
82 years ago.
Packer Park
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| Northeast Corner of Broad and Geary Streets, 1952. | N.H.L. of Geary Street and E.H.L. of Broad Street, 1953. |
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Have a Question or a Comment?
With over 71,282 photographs and maps,
dozens of blog entries, an entire Fine
Art Collection, and a website full of special features, PhillyHistory.org contains a wealth of information. Now we're looking for some information
from you! Do you have a question about a certain photograph? Are you wondering
about how we geocode or map the location of certain photos? Are you curious
about information in a blog entry? Do you have the perfect suggestion
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As we continuously revise, expand, and add more photographs to the website,
we want to ensure that PhillyHistory.org remains a location where
people find the answers to their inquiries, the solutions to their history
mysteries, and the perfect refresher for their memories. We welcome your
questions and comments at all times. So when you get a chance, send us
an e-mail at info@phillyhistory.org,
introduce yourself, and tell us what YOU would like to know!
Here is what some of you have told us:
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so important to preserve all those pictures and restore them and make
them available to everyone. Makes me love my adoptive city even more.
Keep up the good work and thanks for doing this!" -- Berenice
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enjoyed seeing images of our past through this site. Thank you so much
for all the hard work you have done and continue to do." -- L
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I am noticing new features, a smoother interface, and seemingly quicker
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Thank you all so much for your support!