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Photo by General Photographic Agency/Getty Images
Photo by General Photographic Agency/Getty Images
Photo by General Photographic Agency/Getty Images
Every American city is rich with history, even if it isn't always obvious. Dating from 1910 to 1999, these 50 photos tell a story of American city life in still frames. From New York to the Bay Area, look as generations of people, decades of technology and life unfold on the streets of America’s biggest cities.
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Women and children gather outside the exterior of the Capitol building, a place every American should visit in their lifetime.
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Cars race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
A man parks his automobile at an overlook at Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles.
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Trams travel down San Antonio Street in El Paso, Texas.
General Photographic Agency/Getty Images
The Fuller Building, now known as the Flatiron Building, in New York City.
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
Viola LaLonde and Elizabeth Van Tuyl pose beside a Ford automobile.
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
Maxwell Street in a busy shopping district in Chicago.
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A flower stall in San Francisco.
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Two small boys play with a model boat on the lake in Central Park, one of America’s most visited tourist attractions.
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Beams of sunlight streaming through the windows at (the potentially haunted) Grand Central Station in New York City.
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The neon illuminations of a wedding chapel in Las Vegas.
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A view over Hollywood Boulevard and Grauman's Chinese Theatre, a retro movie theater in Hollywood.
Henry Guttmann Collection/Hulton Archive/Getty Images
Children play a game of leapfrog in the streets of Harlem, New York.
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Workers construct the Golden Gate Bridge — one of the world’s most amazing bridges — in the San Francisco Bay.
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The lit-up exterior of Radio City Music Hall in New York.
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House fronts on 61st Street between First and Third Avenues in New York City.
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
A view of a back alley with clotheslines in Philadelphia, one of America’s most caring cities.
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A typical view of the French Quarter with old French homes in New Orleans, the most visited tourist attraction in the state.
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
An exterior view of the old Madison Square Garden in New York City, one of the places in New York where you’re most likely to spot celebrities.
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In this photo, a fruit stand sits in front of a house in Houston, Texas.
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A soldier and a woman walk with their arms around each other in New York City.
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Vacationers on a fairground ride at Coney Island, one of America’s best old-school boardwalks.
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An instructor discusses the rules of cycling safety with a group of pupils in San Jose, California.
L. J. Willinger/Keystone Features/Getty Images
A busy motorway links the Hollywood and Ventura freeways in Los Angeles.
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Transport workers push one of San Francisco's famous cable cars around to face in the opposite direction at its terminus.
Three Lions/Getty Images
People listen to a folk singer on a Sunday afternoon in Washington Square, Greenwich Village, New York.
Three Lions/Getty Images
A disused shop building below a tattoo studio in Boston.
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A rainy afternoon in downtown Detroit.
Peter Keegan/Keystone/Getty Images
A woman in curlers buys a fruit-flavored snow cone on a street corner in Harlem, New York.
Russell Knight and F. Roy Kemp/BIPs/Hulton Archive/Getty Images
A young woman and a girl take part in a beauty parade during Chinese New Year celebrations in Chinatown, Manhattan.
Evans/Three Lions/Getty Images
A view of New Orleans' Door Bar in the city's French Quarter.
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American civil rights demonstrators approach the Capitol in Montgomery, Alabama, at the end of their march from Selma, Alabama.
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
A policeman directs traffic in front of the famous neon billboards of Times Square in New York City.
Susan Schiff Faludi/Three Lions/Getty Images
A street vendor sells popular Mexican and Puerto Rican records on the streets of Spanish Harlem, New York.
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
A woman holds up a pamphlet beside passing cars in the street, San Francisco.
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A policeman stands guard in a Detroit street as buildings are burning during riots that erupted in the city.
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
A police officer escorts a protester to a squad car surrounded by dozens of anti-Vietnam War demonstrators outside the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
A high-angle view of crowds gathered on the Washington Mall during the Poor People's March.
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A group of women enter a job bank in Baltimore.
Keystone Features/Getty Images
Decorations line Canal Street in New Orleans for Mardi Gras.
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People ice skate in Central Park.
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New York streets covered in snow following an extreme winter weather spell.
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Space Mountain, seen here, is one of the top attractions at Disney World’s Magic Kingdom.
Leo Vals/Getty Images
A young man break-dances in Washington Square Park, New York.
Peter Keegan/Getty Images
People take part in the 1983 Gay Pride Parade in New York City. There are even more photos of pride parades through history.
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A float by the City of Santa Ana passes along Colorado Boulevard during the 97th Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena, California.
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A general view of the Hollywood sign on a hill above Los Angeles.
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Fans and friends of rapper Biggie Smalls pay their final respects as his funeral procession winds down St. James' Place in Brooklyn.
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A commercial endorsement off Interstate 90/94 in downtown Chicago depicts Michael Jordan.
AFP PHOTO/John G. MABANGLO
Passersby walk along Pike Place Market in Seattle. A photo of Pike Place is also counted among the 101 most jaw-droppingly beautiful photos of America.
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