Free Library Image Collection, 1810

This website was created for educational purposes only by Patrice Frey, Jennie Graves, and Lauren Hall.

228-230 Spruce Street

254 S. 2nd Street

3rd and Spurce Streets

249 Spruce Street

In 1861, an artist identified only as Taylor made 57 pencil and wash sketches of locations around Philadelphia. His work captures the common cityscapes of Philadelphia in the early 1860's, and provides a rare glimpse of the city's built environment in the initial stages of the Civil War.

Taylor's sketches were bound into a single volume and are now housed at the Winterthur Library in Winterthur, Delaware. This website yields information about four of Taylor's site sketches in Philadelphia's Society Hill neighborhood. The history of these four places tells the story of Society Hill-of prosperity, decline and ultimately renewal-paralleling the history of Philadelphia itself.

Please click on the links above to visit each of the sites.