South Hyde Park, which I define as south of Salisbury Street, has a slightly but not totally different feel than the northern half. The south side has less mansions, more workers’ cottages and some amazing alley houses.

This is a cool building, which clearly once used horses for its business. I suspect that the owners lived upstairs.

I love porches, and they were once very much a part of daily chores, where people who beat out rugs, wash clothes, or do anything that created heat in the summer, keeping the house cooler. I also have heard from many people that sleeping outside on the porch in the hot summer months was done by many people well into the Twentieth Century.

Look at this guy sitting way back on the lot, right on the alley behind. This was not an “alley house,” a lesser rental property built behind the “front house” but rather the main residence.

Half flounders abound in this neighborhood, and this house has enclosed its porch for more living space.