Re-Brooklyn, which hosts images comparing past and present day buildings in the borough, has just posted a cleaner shot of the Norwegian Evangelical Church... or as you may know it: Strauss Auto. The interesting thing here is that if you look at the trim on the side wall, you'll see that the building is the same. An old NYPL image points out the original photo was taken in 1930, and the structure is on 15th Street and 4th Avenue. more ›

With all this rain it may not seem very much like summer out there lately, but hopefully by the 4th will be all sunshine and fireworks. Here are some old images of New York City on Independence Day, courtesy of LIFE's photo archive. Man, people really packed on to those beaches! more ›

Ready to take a depressing walk down memory lane? The somewhat-recently launched Re-Brooklyn blog compares side-by-side photos of locations in their past and present state. The latest entry is of the Broken Angel home on Quincy and Downing Streets (pictured). While that image isn't too shocking, there are some where, say, a Norwegian Evangelical Church is now an auto repair shop, or a row of houses on Snediker and Belmont Avenues has been demolished. [via Brownstoner] more ›

In yet another gem from Modern Mechanix, folks from 1932 ponder "How Much Longer Will Our Big Cities Last?" Photos of subway tunnels collapsing and apartment fires in New York set the apocalyptic tone for the piece which claims "scientific prophets" see the mammoth cities becoming obsolete. We're to pictured a cobweb-enshrouded Empire State Building and dandelions overtaking Wall Street after "exhaustive studies" concluded that we're pretty much, well, screwed.

According to such writers as Stuart Chase, when man built the city he built a Frankenstein monster which would eventually turn and try to destroy its creator. The city, Mr. Chase believes, has grown so intricate and unwieldy that it now dominates its helpless inhabitants, rather than being dominated by them. more ›