Grocery Stores

For almost three hundred years, public markets were the primary retail and wholesale food source for urban Americans. Financed and regulated by municipalities, public markets originally were scheduled events held in the street one or two days a week. During the eighteenth century, street markets gave way to permanent markets constructed in a town’s center. For those towns on the ocean or on navigable rivers, markets were built near the wharves so that goods could easily be unloaded and transported from ships. These markets were frequently grand structures, such as Faneuil Hall and Quincy Market in Boston. Within these spaces, civic authorities leased stalls to butchers, fruiterers, vegetable farmers, and other merchants.