Browse Items (7 total)

This 1970s view of Providence shows how the former route of Interstate 195, along with the railroad yard behind Union Station, isolated downtown Providence from the surrounding neighborhoods.

Downtown Providence is the result of a westward expansion from Market Square, the town’s first commercial center. The gradual transition of business activity across the Providence River in the early years of the nineteenth century resulted in…

The Biltmore Hotel can be seen in the lower right of the image as well as Kennedy Plaza in the foreground. The Biltmore originally opened in 1922. It was closed in 1975 and reopened in 1979. Towards the center of the photo is the Financial District…

According to Jordy, Walker and Gillette’s Industrial National Bank Building (1926-8) is still Providence’s finest skyscraper as it is a “superbly Art Deco culmination of the Providence skyline in a major example of a setback.” Though stepped…

The Providence skyline, including the iconic Industrial Trust Building, pictured from Interstate 95.

The absence of Fleet Center at 50 Kennedy Plaza is noticeable in this shot of downtown from Prospect Terrace Park and dates the image to pre-1985. (date of photograph is approximated)

Aerial view of Providence downtown area. Among America’s oldest cities, Providence has a special sense of place. Like its contemporaries, it has been built and rebuilt many times. Development, however, has not resulted in wholesale destruction and…