Continuity mistake: When Barney disguises himself as an old woman, in the very first shot he's wearing a dress with lace and tiny flowers, but in all the following shots it's an entirely different dress with large groups of flowers. (00:17:40)
Visible crew/equipment: After Andy and Barney walk out of Floyd's shop, when Andy makes a crack about Barney's ears being uneven Andy walks offscreen, then Barney shouts at him as Andy's presumably already down the block, but in their reflection in the window behind them we can see that as soon as Andy walks offscreen in this closeup, he actually stops and leans over where we see the camera's located.
Answer: As noted in the previous answers, in real life, things like this provided wind and/or rain deflection, and also maintained a bit of privacy when blinds were raised somewhat. The interior courthouse set was located in the studio, so the "outside" Main Street didn't exist. I believe these things were added to the courthouse windows for practicality, to avoid some crew movement being visible on the opposite side of those windows. These are not "window boxes" to hold anything, as they're actually bottomless; we can see the Venetian blind's long pull cords under them. They're made of plywood and simple to build, so the "material and labor" was inexpensive. Similar variations made of different materials are in other movies/shows. In 1957's "12 Angry Men," textured chicken wire glass panels are in the jury room windows, and in "Jesse Stone: Night Passage" another type is in Jesse's office windows.
Super Grover ★