The stores on Avenue A served the town of Turners Falls, Massachusetts. This was a planned community and it grew in a strikingly short period of time. From the late 1860s, when it was just an idea, to the early 1900s, when this photograph was taken, the town had grown to include six large and several smaller factories, several thousand residents, and a thriving business district. A man rides a “safety bicycle,” standard after about 1895, and behind him stand the carriages of a store’s patrons. Notice the unpaved street.