Williams St., Lyons N.Y. 79

Williams St., Lyons N.Y. 79

View looking down a Main Street with trolley tracks and blocks of two and three-story masonry commercial buildings on either side. This image is part of a series made by one of the three Eastern Illustrating & Publishing Company photographers assigned to New England or upstate New York. The glass plates would be sent back to Belfast, Maine, and processed into postcards at the printing plant on High Street. Lyons' sophisticated pre- and post-Civil War architecture, including the Ohmann Theater with a marquee, and structures with imposing brick and stone towers, suggest the relative prosperity of this Erie Canal community during the later years of the 19th century and at the time the photo was taken. Lyons' stature as the Wayne County seat also helps explain the presence of robust public amenities, such as standing and overhead street lighting, a streetcar line, and paved streets. The town was regionally famous for the Hotchkiss Essential Oils Company, a successful processor of peppermint which moved to the town to be near the canal in 1841, shortly after the canal was built. The light-colored classical building with the cupola at the far left is a ca. 1840 Greek Revival structure, older than the rest of the buildings in the image. A small gang of boys poses near an early auto for the Eastern photographer, while a couple of women running errands make their way down the sidewalk. Parked cars stand outside storefronts labled "Geo. Napes Cigars and Tobacco", "Lyons Lunch / Regular Dinners", and another cigar store.