Look Who it Was Random video

The Sixth Avenue El and Jefferson Market, 1929

3,254 views · Published 27 April 2018 · 4:08 · Indexed 8 November 2026

Channel: Speed Graphic Film and Video · 2018 · Autos & Vehicles

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This video is in two parts: the first is Fox Movietone sound film taken in 1929 along Sixth Avenue in Greenwich Village.  The second shows how one block in the area, Jefferson Market, has changed over the years.
0:10 Is a view looking north on Sixth Avenue just below 3rd Street.  Above, the El makes the turn from Sixth onto 3rd.  On the surface, the streetcars, trucks and automobiles make their way.  And in the distance, construction of the IND Eighth Avenue Line is underway.
0:46 The camera is on the Greenwich Avenue side of Jefferson Market, looking south towards Sixth Avenue and the Eighth Street stop on the El.  The construction in the foreground is for the new Women's House of Detention.
2:02 Over the construction, we get a view of the backside of the Jefferson Market Courthouse.  In the background, the Elevated trains continue to run past.
2:24 Old print of the original Jefferson Market, built on an irregular block bounded by Sixth Avenue, Tenth Street, Greenwich Avenue and Christopher Street.
2:34 In the late 19th century, the original Jefferson Market was replaced with a three-building complex consisting of a courthouse, a market and a jail.  The Sixth Avenue El was built about the same time.
3:00 In the late 1920's, the market and the old jail were torn down to make way for the new Women's House of Detention, said to be the only Art Deco jail in the world.
3:21 By 1939, the IND Eighth Avenue Subway was complete and the old Sixth Avenue El was taken down, opening up the street.  Buses replaced the streetcars as well.
3:11 The last trials in the Jefferson Market Courthouse were held in 1945.  Community action prevented it from being torn down, and it was converted to a public library in the 1960's.
3:37 By the 1960's, the Women's House of Detention had developed bad reputation for ill-treatment of its inmates.  It closed in 1971 and replaced with a park in 1974.

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