Research methods in visual and comparative analysis: transportation and sociability in Saint-Henri, Quebec and Lowell, Massachusetts, 1905–45

Abstract

This article argues that photographs can make a particular and independent contribution to historical research, but that their value is limited unless contextualized and verified using other sources. A comparative study of Saint-Henri, Quebec and Lowell, Massachusetts employs historical photo-analysis to discern shifting patterns in transportation and sociability on early 20th- century North American city streets. Specific class and gender transformations were tied to the advent of the department store and to the introduction of municipal policies restricting commercial and ‘inappropriate’ activities in the first decade, to a significant rise in tram use after World War I, and to restricted automobile travel in the interwar period. The comparative and visual methodology reveals a gradual decline accompanied by increasing segregation in the social usage of commercial and residential streets during this period.