A hot day under the Brooklyn Elevated railway, 1933, or the ‘El’ as Lovecraft’s letters often called the city’s elevated train service.

The trains would periodically thunder noisily above the walker, as seen in the picture. In a letter Lovecraft once reported that his friend Frank Belknap Long had to ‘hike for the El’, meaning Long had to walk a long distance on the sidewalk under the high rails. With the aim of reaching the wooden stairs leading up to an elevated platform, and a rail line heading in the desired direction.