Topics Landscape Changes

Map Lovers’ Monday: Topography of Philadelphia from 1863

The Discovery Center: The creative reuse of an abandoned city reservoir

History of Belfield (1934)

Early photographs of Fairmount and vicinity, 1848

Black-and-white diagram showing streets and the Little Tacony Creek

Frankford Creek Watershed: A historical overview of the Philadelphia section

Black-and-white image shows a trolley car emerging from a building with men standing alongside

Filling Low Land: A Story of Ash-Dumping in the Wingohocking Creek Watershed

Archival Storytelling: A snowy Super Bowl Sunday at Sydenham & Dauphin

Fairmount Gardens, with the Schuylkill Bridge. This 1839 engraving, published in London, shows a view of the South Garden from the walkways that brought visitors up the cliffside to the overlooks at the height of the reservoirs. The fountain used the pressure of the reservoirs and was a a delightful refreshment in hot weather, and a wonder at all times. One anachronistic element of this engraving is the Upper Ferry Bridge, which burned the year before the print was published. Harding’s Hotel, a popular resort, is at the western end of the bridge.

Fairmount Gardens with the Schuylkill Bridge, 1839

Birkinbine Schuylkill Hydrographical Survey 1861-66

Schuylkill River Hydrographical Survey 1861-66 by H. P. M. Birkinbine

View of Fairmount Water Works, ca. 1827

Lemon Hill and Sedgley Park, Graff Jr., 1851 (Graff05.21)

Plan of Lemon Hill and Sedgley Park, Fairmount and Adjoining Property, 1851