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I got this email on the Racing History List as an off-topic post, and thought some people here would enjoy the footage. Below is the email I had received:
What you are about to see is truly fantastic...."Right of Way and Pedestrian" hadn't been coined as a phrase yet....
It's a fascinating movie and a piece of real history. A camera on the front of a street car 104 years ago!
Look at the hats the ladies were wearing and the long dresses. Some of the cars had the steering wheels on the right side, when do you think they were standardized on the left?
Sure was still a lot of horse drawn vehicles in use. Mass transit looked like the way to get around. Looks like everybody had the right of way!
This 104 year old film was "lost" for many years. It was the first 35mm film ever and was taken by camera mounted on the front of a cable car. The number of automobiles is amazing for 1906. The clock tower is at the end of Market Street at
the Embarcadero wharf and it's still there. How many "street cleaning" people were employed to pick up after the horses? Talk about going green!
This film, originally thought to be from 1905 until David Kiehn with the Niles Essanay Silent FilmMuseum figured out exactly when it was shot. From New York trade papers announcing the film showing, to the wet streets from recent heavy rainfall & shadows indicating time of year & actual weather and conditions on historical record, even when the cars were registered (he even knows who owned them and when the plates were issued!). It was filmed only four days before the Great California Earthquake of April 18th 1906 and
shipped by train to NY for processing. Amazing, but true!
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What you are about to see is truly fantastic...."Right of Way and Pedestrian" hadn't been coined as a phrase yet....
It's a fascinating movie and a piece of real history. A camera on the front of a street car 104 years ago!
Look at the hats the ladies were wearing and the long dresses. Some of the cars had the steering wheels on the right side, when do you think they were standardized on the left?
Sure was still a lot of horse drawn vehicles in use. Mass transit looked like the way to get around. Looks like everybody had the right of way!
This 104 year old film was "lost" for many years. It was the first 35mm film ever and was taken by camera mounted on the front of a cable car. The number of automobiles is amazing for 1906. The clock tower is at the end of Market Street at
the Embarcadero wharf and it's still there. How many "street cleaning" people were employed to pick up after the horses? Talk about going green!
This film, originally thought to be from 1905 until David Kiehn with the Niles Essanay Silent FilmMuseum figured out exactly when it was shot. From New York trade papers announcing the film showing, to the wet streets from recent heavy rainfall & shadows indicating time of year & actual weather and conditions on historical record, even when the cars were registered (he even knows who owned them and when the plates were issued!). It was filmed only four days before the Great California Earthquake of April 18th 1906 and
shipped by train to NY for processing. Amazing, but true!