(click on any image to see source in its URL, sorry, no direct links) This was originally titled “Eight View of Maria-Theresien-Strasse” but I found one of the images redundant and therefor it was pulled. Sorry for any confusion.

In the beginning, street life looked somewhat chaotic. All of these images include the Annasäule (column) so they are all after 1704. However, the first expansion out of the original Altstadt, that is, the Neustadt (which later became Maria-Theresien-Strasse), began in 1281.

The street is still unpaved, but now that it’s cleaned up, it looks a little on the sterile side. It’s probably a Sunday, around the turn of the century.

An undated postcard. The streets are paved, the tram line is in. Dress lengths and the men’s suits suggest sometime after 1916 and before the Roaring Twenties.

This is from 1939. Still horse carts but now we’ve got jazzy convertibles.

This is also apparently from 1939, although it looks like it may have been taken around Hitler’s first visit in April 1938. Nazi flags galore. Note the Hitler portrait over the door at far left, with the slogan “Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer“. The woman at right, in the light-colored jacket with the bundle in her hand, gazing quietly across the street. What is she thinking?

Same street, 1950s.  What a change. After the war, denazification certificates were referred to slangily as Persilschein, Persil being a brand of whitening laundry soap. Here it looks as if the entire street has been washed in Persil.

Today Maria-Theresien-Strasse is a thriving pedestrian shopping zone,  most recently even cycling through is not permitted at the northern end (the part you see here).

The Annasäule has been there since the early eighteenth century, even if its statues have been replaced over time. Despite its name, the figure at the top is actually the Virgin Mary. St. Anne stands below (facing the mountains), along with Sts. George, Cassian and Vigilian. The pillar was erected in commemoration of the expulsion of warring Bavarians on St. Anne’s Day in 1703, hence the name.