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City maps & Historic Tourism
(with thanks to authors  Sarah Vowell and Richard Holmes)

I've been experimenting with Google Maps and Google Earth as they seem incredibly well suited to getting maps of neighborhoods EJ Phillips lived and/or worked in. The web has become increasingly valuable for history and historical accounts over the past 10-15 years. It took me awhile to realize that the Willard and Palmer House Hotels were not the buildings EJ Phillips had stayed at -- though I think they are on the same sites.  New York, with a wealth of addresses and years of letters has been the most tractable (and compact) place to investigate.  Washington DC has provided some true surprises and Boston is a work in progress. 

Boston  When I moved to Boston in 1979 I never dreamed I would read letters from a relative talking about the flowers in the Public Garden or going to Longfellow's House in Cambridge.  I still need to check out (and transcribe a letter) an excursion EJ Phillips made to City Point {Castle Island) and I haven't really figured out which new park was unfinished in 1888.  Did EJ Phillips ever visit Quincy Market or Faneuil Hall?  the Union Oyster House in the Blackstone Block?  She almost certainly saw the State House, the Park Street Church, and the Granary Burying Ground. 

How much of the Freedom Trail would she have been likely to see?  http://www.nps.gov/bost/bost_lographics/ftrail.htm

Old Landmarks of Boston    Boston Railway stations     Community Heritage Maps http://communityheritagemaps.com/
Boston Streets: Mapping Directory Data, Tufts University  http://dca.tufts.edu/features/bostonstreets/index.html

Boston hotels and theaters
US Hotel, Beach Street, between Lincoln and Kingston  1886-1893  Still around in 1895 according to Bostonian Society photo on web Jan 2007.
Hotel Bowdoin 1895  Bowdoin Square  [try 1 Bowdoin Square]
photograph of Bowdoin Square 1920 http://www.picturehistory.com/find/p/1500/mcms.html shows the Custom House Tower

Bijou Theatre 543-547 Washington Street
Boston Museum  18 -28 Tremont Street, between Court and School Street
Boston Theatre Washington Street, near West Street
Park Theatre Washington Street near the corner of Boylston

more Boston and Cambridge Historic Tourism

Buffalo walking tour  Great architecture, Olmstead parks and the Historical Society building from the Pan American Exposition of 1901 -- reminds me of the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago.  Many thanks to Ellen and George

Buffalo hotels
Hotel Iroquois  Oct. 1890, Main & Eagle Streets, southeast corner  http://freenet.buffalo.edu/bah/h/iroqH/index.html 
Hotel Genesee 1895 2 Fountain Plaza [now a Hyatt Hotel]

Chicago    
Chicago hotels

Palmer House
17 East Monroe Street
Sherman House
Randolph Street between Clark and LaSalle
Tremont House 
Lake And Dearborn Streets
Leland Hotel 1890
Michigan Ave. Boulevard & Jackson St.

Cincinnati of John Nickinson and EJ Phillips  I haven't really been to Cincinnati, only the airport (which is in Kentucky).  But I did find some nice photographic histories in the airport bookstore.   

Cincinnati of John Nickinson and EJP
EJP and John Nickinson came to Cincinnati 1860
Pike's Opera House, Fourth Street & Vine Street, southeast corner. John Nickinson was the stage manager at the time of his death.  EJ Phillips appeared there with Junius Brutus Booth Jr. the night Lincoln was assassinated in April 1865.
EJP lived at 208 West Fifth Street in 1864 according to the "Spirit Letter"  Was this where she and John Nickinson had lived?
John Nickinson was photographed at Dewey's Gallery 102 West Fifth St., bet. Vine & Race 1862

John Nickinson died Feb. 9, 1864 at the apothecary store of Mr. C.H. Brutton, on the north-west corner of Fifth and Elm streets and is buried at Spring Grove Cemetery 4521 Spring Grove Ave.
Photograph of Hattie, Hoag and Quicke's Art Palace 100 Fourth Street c. 1865
Photograph of Albert, Ball & Thomas Photographic Art Gallery 120 West Fourth Street near Race c. 1865

Burnet House, Third and Vine, built 1850, EJP stayed in Jan.1893
Palace Hotel,  Sixth and Vine, northwest corner, opened 1882, EJP stayed in Nov. 1893

Los Angeles
Hotel Nadeau 202 West 1st Street [now site of the LA Times]
Hotel Ramona
, Cor. Spring and Third Streets, FB Mallory, Prop, Sept. 1896

Middletown, NY

New Orleans   

New York and John Nickinson  March 2005  Other letters and the play Burnt Over   Manhattan Walking tours

Photographer, John Nickinson, CD Fredericks & Co., 587 Broadway, New York, 1863

Philadelphia   

San Francisco   

Toronto  

Washington DC 

Hotels and not much else so far
Cleveland, Ohio
Hollenden Hotel Jan.1893, Nov. 1893 
Superior Ave. and East 6th St.

Columbus Ohio
American Hotel March 1895

Kansas City
Coates House 
Tenth and Broadway 1887

Last updated Sept 8, 2006

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