Portland’s Exchange Street in photos from the 1950s and ’60s
Exchange Street in Portland: A Glimpse of the Old Port’s Working‑Class Past
Long before the cobblestone lanes of Portland’s Old Port were lined with boutiques and cafés, the narrow streets that now host trendy restaurants carried the bustle of a working‑class neighborhood. A series of historic photographs taken between 1951 and 1967 shows Exchange Street as it once was—a place where factories, furniture shops, and everyday commuters intersected under a sky that sometimes shivered with snow.
The earliest image, captured on a snowy day in 1951, looks up from Exchange Street toward Portland City Hall. The buildings that flank the street in the frame were home to Royal Typewriters and Hooper’s Furniture, two staples of the mid‑century commercial district. Photographer John Olson, who documented the city for the local press, noted the steady stream of vehicles and pedestrians that made the street a hub of commerce.
Three years later, on September 19, 1954, the same photographer turned his lens to a traffic mishap at the upper stretch of Exchange Street. An illegally parked delivery truck had blocked the road long enough to cause a queue of cars. A police officer stepped in, moved the vehicle, and issued the driver a ticket. The incident, captured in a photo that still circulates in local archives, illustrates the everyday challenges of a busy street that served both industry and residents.
By 1959, the office building at 102 Exchange Street had already endured a dramatic change. A fire the previous year reduced the four‑story structure to a two‑story edifice, a transformation that the photograph shows in stark relief. The building’s conversion is a reminder of how quickly the neighborhood could shift from prosperity to adversity—and then rebuild.
The 1960s brought new players to the street. In November 1966, a photo taken by Olson shows a cluster of six buildings on lower Exchange Street that were recently acquired by Canal National Bank. The purchase marked a shift in ownership that would set the stage for future redevelopment, even as the area remained a working‑class enclave.
The final image in the collection, dated August 17, 1967, focuses on the corner of Exchange and Federal Streets. It highlights the former Roscoe S. Davis & Co. storefront, a commercial space that still stands today as the Corner Room Italian Restaurant & Bar. City of Portland real‑estate records confirm that the building was erected in 1900, underscoring the long history of commerce on that corner.
Taken together, these photographs tell a story of a street that once served as Portland’s industrial backbone. The businesses that once lined Exchange Street—typewriters, furniture, and various other trades—were part of a broader fabric that supported the city’s working‑class residents. The images also hint at the forces of change: fires, traffic congestion, new ownership, and the eventual arrival of new businesses that would transform the area into the vibrant Old Port we know today.
For those walking the streets of Exchange Street now, the photographs provide a tangible link to a past that helped shape the character of Portland. They remind residents and visitors alike that every cobblestone and storefront carries memories of the everyday lives that once unfolded here.
