Book Street Opening Day at the Reading Terminal Market

In the late 1980s I operated a newsstand and bookstore at the busy 12th and Filbert Street entrance to the Reading Terminal Market. This is a video of the official opening day of the store with some footage of other merchant stands and the usual crowds. Friends and family helped me mark the occasion and speak on camera. The market shrunk in size with the building of the Pennsylvania Convention Center above it, a fire safety stairwell displaced my store and with the downsizing of the market,many day merchants who sold their wares atop old railway carts were likewise displaced. In the store's closing days I opposed building a convention center there, in the center of the city because it would create awful traffic congestion and a large dead zone when conventions were in town. The Center is real nice but I still think its siting was a mistake.

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• book
• street
• newsstand
• reading
• terminal
• market
• philadelphia

[MalcolmXPark]

Very Nice! Great classic footage of Reading Terminal...