Congress Street looking north, Portsmouth, New Hampshire, circa 1905

About this postcard

A black-and-white view up Congress Street toward the north, with brick commercial blocks and awnings on the left, horse-drawn wagons and buggies lining both curbs, and trolley tracks running down the center of the unpaved roadway. On the right rises a mansard-roofed block and, beyond it, a tall white church spire with a clock face — the landmark steeple of Portsmouth's North Church at Market Square. The scene records the city's downtown during the early street-railway era, when delivery wagons and carriages still shared the street with the trolley line.