625 South Broad Street, The Burg
Once upon a time this was Capitol Motors.
This picture is from the 1950s:)
6 years ago
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6 comments:
Mack:
This property was purchased by the State or City and used for a Motor Pool. The Dealer moved to Artic Parkway and I believe they went out of business and became Hamilton Motors on route 33.
Hi JoeB:)
This is before my Burg Era but
I found a pic and posted it for
the folks who came before me.
Was this before or after the railroad tracks?
Mack:
It was right after the rail road tracks on the left side going towards State and Broad. I think that might be Federal and S.Broad.
This dealership was really a modern facility when it opened in 1949. It was located on the corner at South Broad and the end of Third St. I think that was still Third. The street made a sharp turn just before coming out on Broad.
Previously, Capitol Motors was located at Front and Warren in a very old and narrow building, with it's service entrance in the alley off of Front.
If you look down the side of the building, on Third, that group of windows fronted the Parts Department and in later years, they parked a row of new cars along those windows, as well as filling the showroom. It looked quite impressive as you approached the dealership from the North, especially at night, with the building lit up. There was a small used car lot to the left of the building and then the railroad crossing. I believe there was another railroad crossing on the Third St side.
Some of the most beautiful Chrysler products were sold from this location, including the Virgil Exner designed 1955 line of cars and huge finned 1957 line. During this period, Chrysler introduced the hemi V8 and the letter series 300s.
I made many visits to Capitol Motors, collecting sales brochures for all of the new models. Our family bought 4 or 5 Chryslers from them.
They moved from this location to Arctic Parkway in the 1960s. Later,they sold just Plymouths for a while at that location (possibly under different ownership). Irv Roth opened Hamilton Chrysler Plymouth on Rt 33, probably in the 1970s and recently, he was one of the dealers closed down by Chrysler during their bankruptcy.
Remember the Chrysler Turbine Car that was displayed here once? Sharp!
The owner of Capitol Motors was Samuel Himmelstein.
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