Hello. I grew up at Mascher and Godfrey in Olney in the 70's and 80's. does anyone have any photos from the before this time?

it would be much appreciated.

thanks,

joe

Try looking at phillyhistory.org. You can search the city archive's historic photograph collection by address. Once you search, make sure to click the box next to "include records without digitzed media," as it will bring up more results this way. Then if you see any records for photographs that haven't been scanned yet that you are interested in, you can request that the photograph be scanned.

Hi Joe. There is a great website with lots of historic Philly photos at http://phillyhistory.org. You can search a lot of diffrent ways, including by neighborhood. There are currently 58 photos of Olney in the database, mostly of Olney schools being built in the '20s and '30s, but there are also a few general neighborhood shots too.

The Free Library of Philadelphia also has some historic photos of Philly uploaded to the library website here: http://libwww.library.phila.gov/hip/index.cfm. Olney isn't one of the neighborhoods listed but it's worth a look anyway.

Needless to say there are also a lot of old Philly photos in the Central Library's collection that are not digitized/online, so if you're local, pay a visit to 1901 Vine Street and ask in Social Science and History, and also in Prints and Pictures. The librarians there will also be able to point you to additional sources for old images.

If you're not local you can email your request to the Free Library with the web form here: http://libwww.library.phila.gov/faq/eref.cfm

Happy hunting!

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I lived at 2nd and Kenilworth (across from Dougherty) in the early 60's and off and on til the early 80's...I'll see what I can dig up.
Check out the Tell me about Olney thread under North Philadelphia...here in PhillyBlog.

Thanks everyone for your replies. I had looked at phillyhistory.org and saw the ones they had for Olney but I was looking for some more of the neighborhood, possibly of the 5th street shopping area (when it was still nice) and of Cardinal Dougherty and St. Helena's, my former schools.

calcynic - I'd appreciate anything you have

grimmgrrl - thanks for all the info. I figured the library would have it. Just didn't know exactly where to go. I am local (Mayfair) so i'll take a trip down there. I also heard that Temple has a big urban archives section

The Temple Urban Archives in Paley Library does have many old Olney photos. Many of them come from the massive amount of photos given them by the old Philadelphia Evening Bulletin after they folded in 1982. I have seen many old newspaper articles about Olney, mainly human interest stuff, in their files, and extensive photos of the area in the 50's. Good luck!

Kukla65th, thanks so much for the info. I just checked out their site. they want $12 per repro! I wanted to go down there and get alot of shots and then do a website comprised of then and now shots but I don;t know if I can afford that!!

thanks,
joe

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"Waiting for the moment when the moment has been waiting for so long"

The Philadelphia Archdiocesan Historical Research Ctr. will have photos of Dougherty, and St. Helena's. Along with Dougherty basketball games, etc.
http://www.rc.net/philadelphia/pahrc

Is this the Temple link that you have?

http://diamond.temple.edu:81/search~...&Submit=Search

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You are very wise...

jerzee, this is not the link to the Paley library but I have seen this link before. someone earlier in this thread suggested the Paley library and that is where I got the $12 fee from. I wonder if the digital diamond has different pricing?

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"Waiting for the moment when the moment has been waiting for so long"