Bayside Yesterday

This photo, taken long ago on the fault line where Parkside meets
Bayside, presents many mysteries. When was it taken?
At first glance it looks like hardworking laborers about 1890 laying
granite paving stones into today's Park Avenue, at the point where it becomes
Portland Street, at the junction with Forest Avenue. But a closer look reveals that the street is already paved with blocks, with trolley tracks embedded. Overhead, trolley lines, electric lines, and phone lines are thickly strung. The gent at center (holding the pole) sports a straw boater and a three-piece suspiciously modern suit,
and a magnifying glass reveals behind him reveals several Ford touring cars
chugging down the Avenue, with Deering Oaks in the far right distance.
In addition, the abandoned brick buildings at right (one roofless)
were torn down in the early 1930s to make room for the present brick Portland Post
Office on Forest Avenue, a massive WPA project in the New Deal days. Likely the laborers are taking UP the street, along the line of Forest
Avenue, to install the sewer lines that still serve the Post Office and
this neighborhood.
The brick buildings on the right were replaced by today's Post
Office turn-out and parking lot off Portland Street. On the left, the
brick building with the awning (behind the stacked stones) still
stands, until earlier this month a metal- and fine silversmithing shop.
The wooden buildings beyond are today the parking lot for the C.N. Brown
gas station at this corner.
But note--the 2 1/2- story wooden building with white trim is
special to Bayside's story. It is the grocery store of Lemuel Osgood,
only son of Sea Captain Francis Osgood, whose lovely green Victorian
home on Mechanic Street was just moved last year to grace a revitalized
neighborhood by Bayside's Stone Street playground.
And so this one photo, taken about 1933, embraces the old and new
spirit of a busy city and an ever-changing Bayside.
What else can sharp-eyed Baysiders see in this photo? Let us know.

-State Rep. Herb Adams