This Is What Flatiron Looked Like Before The Flatiron Building

Old school NYC is endlessly fascinating, the bars, the restaurants, the old ass film footage with crappy soundtracks, and this photo we stumbled upon showing the area around 23rd Street, Broadway, and Fifth Avenue, or the epicenter of what we now know as the Flatiron District. Except, the photo is so old, that it predates the completion of the Flatiron Building in 1902 by almost 20 years. Before that big, narrow wedge of a building  existed, the people hustling through the streets -- probably to whatever the Eataly equivalent of the day was, like an extra big oyster cart or something -- had to look at a giant Heinz advertisement for things like baked beans and peach butter! Probably didn't make for very good selfies...

Check it out below. It's pretty astonishing to see how much NYC different and familiar NYC was close to 100 years ago. 

The New York Historical Society/Getty Images

Tony Merevick is Cities News Editor at Thrillist and has totally been guilty of standing over there taking pictures of the Flatiron Building for Instagram, but that was totally before he even moved here. Follow him on Twitter @tonymerevick.