S side James St looking W from opposite #18 is now a parking lot on July 21, 1960

Tony Russo (pseudonym) writes:
“That car in the foreground looks just like the car I owned. When they built those monstrous skyscrapers in the 1970s, the work crews were all Italians. They were mafia. They hired vandals and homeless to go in these homes and set them on fire, in order to justify demolition. Everybody lost. Nobody won. Nobody won because the parking lot and skyscraper they built in place of these homes is now empty and has so few tenants. You could say that the bad blood came around. The animals. They tore up our beautiful neighborhood for this.”

S side Orange St looking SW from NE corner Jay on July 2, 1961

“​Geozinger” (username) writes:
“This is a treasure trove of pics from back in the day. I love these ‘slice of life’ candids; showing everything frozen in time and the sometimes odd juxtapositions of objects.

“For as downtrodden as the area may be described, there seems to be decent looking cars on the streets. Many of the pics show cars 3-4 years old. On the other hand, cars were usually pretty much finished after three years of daily use…”

W side Hunterdon looking SW from NE corner Lawton on April 21, 1962

Jane Davis writes:
“I must have been age eight or nine. I walked down the stairs of our family home at 161 Watson Avenue late at night. And I remember overhearing my parents arguing in whispered tones talking about what to do. They had just received the government notice, evicting them from their home to build the highway. They argued: ‘Should we sell right away and get away? Or should we stay and fight to get a fair price for the value of our home?’ In the end, we left. I remember their conversation all these decades later.”