New Haven’s an old city and a literary one, too, so of course it’s gone through edits.
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And on the backs, sides and even fronts of brick and stone buildings, you can still see some of those revisions—old windows bricked over; new windows bricked out; others expanded or contracted; even, apparently, a spot where a window was supposed to go but never did.
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Some cases are more mysterious. Along Center Street east of Church, there was once a stepwise something-or-other well above eye level. On the Wells Fargo building at Church and Elm, rectangular strips of newer-mortared bricks hang like picture frames between arches. Weathering differences on the side of 196 Park Street reveal what appears to be the profile of a long-gone neighbor’s roof and chimney.
You don’t necessarily have to go through history books or old maps or city archives to see the changes New Haveners have seen fit to make. Sometimes it’s enough to keep an eye out for the whiteout.
Written and photographed by Dan Mims.
