Vendors' shouts

Yesterday, in a hotel room, I stopped my poor wife that, like a whirlwind, was getting ready to go out. She had the make up in one hand, the shoes in the other and the husband still on the computer, but she actually stopped for a second and answered. In that moment I had again my obvious answer to the philosophical dilemma of the historian: “What do I need to finish the research?”. New Evidence? Another trip to the archives? My only answer is patience: the patience of the wife.

But I think and hope that was not only patience that stopped my wife for a moment behind my shoulder. She seemed indeed interested to the black and white photo on the monitor. I just asked her what street of Philadelphia was on the picture, and the answer was very interesting to me.

“The Italian market!”

The large street in the photo was clearly bending on the left and I said that the Italian market, if I was not mistaken, is on a narrow and perfectly straight road.

Docks St. 1908. Lib of Congress.

I was right: it was not 9^th Street. My spidey sense of historian helped again in the path to the truth (and the very descriptive caption on the bottom too). But I missed the point. Indeed my wife in a way was right and I was wrong: it was indeed a market, a busy street crowded by customers, piles of boxes, barrels and carriages parked nearby the big sunshades that extended the shops on the streets. Nothing resembled Docks Street of today, with the fancy-cut stone on the ground, the pretty trees and grass on the side and the modern like houses behind the curtains of the leaves.

Docks St. today.

This past has been erased and has left few other traces than the name of the street. So when I told my wife that this was the street that disturbed our poor bottoms of bike riders the other day, she was surprised and interested, at least for the 20 seconds that she could dedicate to it before reminding me that we had to leave the room (and this, my friend, is the privilege of who are living in the past and the curse of the ones living around them).
Last Tuesday we had the lesson at Powel house on 3^rd Street. We will work on some projects on the House in this semester. A pleasant bike ride from my place, the house has a pretty but not stunning façade, a big old door and the stone steps consumed by age. Inside there is a more that decent house, owned by one of the richest men of the Colonies and of the infant U.S.

On the ground floor, his parlor suggests a rich but not lavish life, made of business and appointments. The mahogany stairs remind us, step by step, how it is made a well-made work of an artisan that knows his trade. On the first floor, bright and luminous, the ballroom: a magnificent room with stuccos and mirrors, a beautiful chandelier hang in the center of the ceiling, it is easy to imagine it with his load of candles in an elegant night. On the fireplace the coat of arms of Samuel Powel: “Proprium decus et patrum” - Pride of yourself and of your fathers- (you betcha dude, clearly you don’t like to show off!) and on the side the chairs that gave some rest to Samuel Adams’ or Washington’s feet during the dances.

Yes I said Washington. The saint patron of U.S.A. came here multiple times and was a family friend. But I don’t care: I can, I am Italian and my saint patron is Garibaldi. What really got me was the view from the windows. A couple of skyscrapers and a less than attractive block of houses from the ‘60s. Someone pointed out how should have been at the time: roofs with smoke climbing out of the chimneys, some green fields on the right, where only a couple of blocks to the south the city ended, the masts of the ships on the Delaware all lined on the horizon trying to hide New Jersey on the other side of the river. My mind traveled for a moment and saw the mud on the streets with the people walking with a hand on the cocked hat in a windy day, the noise of the carts rolling around and the voices in the markets screaming their prices. The same voice, on different goods and different times, that my wife heard in the photo of Docks Street in 1908.