Abstract: This collection contains photographs of real estate parcels in the five boroughs of New York City, dated between 1939-1951, with the bulk of the images dating from 1939-1941. These photographs were part of a new property card system for assessing real property tax in the city, carried out by the Works Project Administration (WPA) and the New York City Tax Department. Although photographs were taken of most extant properties at the time, some tax-exempt buildings, parcels with vacant lots or...

Abstract: The collection consists of 35mm color negatives and 3.5 x 5 inch color prints (printed from the negatives) created by the New York City Department of Finance, 1982-1988, to document all real property (structures and land) for tax assessment purposes. There are approximately 900,000 images spanning the five boroughs of New York City.