Video footage from the past has a special quality that reminds us of the universality of humanity. We're all the same, you know?

It doesn't so much seem to matter when and where the footage was shot.

Videos from another time are interesting because it reminds us of how amazingly similar people are by the demonstration of our time/place-sensitive differences-- which pale in comparison. 

It doesn't matter if it's the 1990s, like with this Times Square footage, or the 1890s with this YouTube video below. New Yorkers are New Yorkers. So scope out how we used to do back just before the turn of the century. Not this century, though; last century.

[anad]

There's shots from the Brooklyn Bridge very soon after it was built, New Yorkers ice skating, even what the City looked like after the Blizzard of 1888 that wiped out a lot of important infrastructure. 

New Yorkers kept going though, with snow piles as tall as people, like we always do. Check it out below. 

https://youtu.be/qr7kRYO29n4

Check Out These Vintage Photos of Transportation Through the Years in NYC

[via YouTube]