North Main St. Bristol, Conn. 119.

North Main St. Bristol, Conn. 119.

Scene of a commercial street with trolley rail line in the roadway. This image is part of a series made by one of the three Eastern Illustrating & Publishing Company photographers assigned to cover New England or upstate New York. The quest for images that would be saleable as postcards resulted in the documentation of small towns and small town life at the turn of the 20th century. As the photos were shot, the glass plates were promptly sent back to Belfast, Maine, and processed into postcards at the printing plant on High Street. A couple of shopworkers stand in the entrances of their stores and pose for the Eastern photographer standing across the street. One is a man in an apron-- perhaps the proprietor- -of the J. F. Crowley grocery. Next door to the left is Modern Lunch. To the right is a delicatessen, where a woman in a full-front apron stands looking at the camera. "Drink Coca Cola" and "New Haven Dairy Ice Cream" signs bedeck the shopfronts, as well as reminders about "Butter and Eggs" for sale. Across the side street a sign identifies a fish market; further down is a gabled frame building with a second story porch and shops below. Next door, a man works on the scaffolding covering the facade of a large, multi-story building.