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E. Michigan Ave., Eastlund Concrete, 2007

This 2007 Eastlund stamp is on the south side of East Michigan Avenue between Hosmer and 8th. There are many like it between Sparrow and the traffic circle at Washington Square. There was a big construction project that tore everything up in 2006, and Eastlund must have gotten the contract to put the sidewalk back. I chose this one to photograph mainly as an excuse to show you what it’s in front of: a set of ghost stairs.

These stairs are between the Classic Barber Shop (which is attached to Stober’s Bar) and Moriarty’s Pub. They lead to nothing more than a small green space. I suppose one could say that they serve as a street access for the side doors of the two adjacent buildings, but they’re really a relic of a house that once stood here.

I know about this house from perusing the Caterino Real Estate Image Collection, a wonderful resource that the Capital Area District Library has digitized. From 1963 to 1989, a local history enthusiast named David Caterino drove around taking photos of old buildings around Lansing, probably ones that he had reason to think would be demolished soon. On January 31, 1986 – thirteen and a half years before my arrival in Lansing – he took photos of a house at 808 East Michigan. The stairs can be seen in one photo, looking just as they look now. I wish Caterino had taken a wider view of the house from the street, but from what can be seen, it was a large and grand house, with unusually steep gables. An access stairway to the second story had been added in the rear, suggesting it spent its later years subdivided into apartments. In the rear view photo it is also evident how close it was building next door, currently Moriarty’s Pub.

I thought that was as much as I would be able to tell you about the house, but then I realized I could also check the Belon Real Estate Collection, a set of index cards that CADL has also digitized. The cards represent quick information for real estate agents about properties listed from the 1950s through early 1970s. There are a few listings for 808 East Michigan, listed together with 810, which then as today was a barber shop. There is a photo with them, which is very grainy from being copied but does give a better sense of how it looked from the street. The owner of both apparently lived in the apartment above the barber shop. If I’m reading things right, it failed to sell in 1961 at a listing price of $55,000, then in 1964 the same owner tried and failed again at $47,500, and then once again in 1971 at $62,000. Unfortunately, the year built is given in one card as 1946 (this can’t mean the house and must be the barber shop) and in another as N/A. I would guess it was a late 19th century house. According to the 1961 card, it was divided into five apartments: one two-bedroom and two one-bedrooms downstairs, and one two-bedroom and one one-bedroom upstairs.

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Hickory St., Illegible

This is somewhere around the fourth time I’ve gone to try to read this stamp, located on the south side of Hickory Street between Euclid and Pennsylvania. I really wonder what the resident here thinks about the person who keeps pulling up, getting out of the car, kicking at the sidewalk a bit, and then leaving again. Unfortunately, I think this one is uncrackable. It’s just too worn. I’ve tried different times a day and different sidewalk conditions, and I think all that’s left would be to use one of the tricks of gravestone readers and push aluminum foil into it. I’m not sure I quite have the nerve to do that because of the likelihood of having to explain to someone what I’m up to. I’m tempted, though.

It’s clearly old, not just because it’s worn but because of the style. The date looked (and felt; I traced my finger in it) like “10” on this visit. I’m almost positive the first digit is 1 but the second could be anything relatively round.

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Hickory St., Illegible

I have tried so many times to get this old-looking stamp and today I failed yet again. It was too muddy the first time I saw it, then it was too icy, then it was too dark, then there was a dog loose and I was afraid to get close enough, now it’s too icy and too muddy. Here’s what I got, after peeling a stuck leaf off. I need the ice to finish melting and then a good rain to come and wash the grime off it.

I hope the resident here hasn’t noticed how many times I have pulled up in front of their house, stared at the sidewalk for a while, gotten back into the car, and driven off.

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Hickory St., BBRPCI, 1985

I failed trying to collect the interesting unknown stamp on Hickory Street again. It was too dark by the time I managed to get there after work, and the nearest street light was out. I had to settle for this BBRPCI stamp next door. This is on the south side of Hickory between Euclid and Pennsylvania. It’s also quite close to the J.F. Sowa home that I wrote about previously.

Thank you, whoever lives here, for salting your sidewalk!

While I was scouting, I heard a tremendous rumbling, which was a train coming on the nearby tracks, on the other side of Euclid. I walked to the end of the street to watch it. It was quite loud as it passed, reminding me of my parents’ old house (which I lived in during school breaks from college). It was close to the railroad tracks in Chelsea, and a train would go by every night. At first it woke me all the time, but eventually it didn’t anymore.

The stamp is not really visible here, but it’s near the lower edge of the photo.
The train passing. The top of Boji Tower is visible beyond.
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City Market Drive, Bearstone Construction, 2018

I took this photo when returning to the car after Silver Bells (Lansing’s annual holiday parade). The stamp is located inside the Lansing Center’s parking garage off City Market Drive.

I had previously and mistakenly believed that the Lansing Center was built in the 1950s. I think I had been confused by reading old newspapers that referenced a civic center in connection with popular midcentury mayor Ralph W. Crego. In fact, that was the Lansing Civic Center, which functioned mainly as a concert venue. It was renamed the Lansing Civic Arena in its later years to avoid confusion with the Lansing Center. The Lansing Center was only built in 1987, which is very surprising to me. That means when I came to town in 1999 it practically had a bit of new-development shine still on it. The Lansing Civic Arena was demolished in 1999. It had been at the southeast corner of Allegan and Pine Streets.

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N. Grand Ave., F & M Construction, 2010

I spotted this new-to-me contractor stamp while I was downtown to walk in the Turkey Trot 5K on Thanksgiving morning. It’s on the west side of North Grand Avenue next to Fire Station #1, which faces Shiawassee. There is a stamp on the driveway apron as well as the sidewalk.

The driveway apron stamp.

According to the city’s Web site about fire stations, Fire Station #1 was built in 1949 and extensively remodeled in 2006, which accounts for why it looks rather new. It is nicknamed “The Big House.”

The driveway apron in context in front of the fire station.

I can’t find out much about F & M Construction. Most likely they are F & M Concrete Construction, which I can find listings for placing them on Creyts Road in Dimondale. OpenCorporates shows that “F and M Concrete Construction LLC” of Dimondale only incorporated in 2013, but I would guess it is the same business responsible for this stamp.

This one is on the sidewalk.

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W. Michigan Ave., East Jordan Iron Works Sewer Grate

I walked the Silver Bells in the City 5K the morning after Silver Bells (Lansing’s annual holiday night parade) and afterward on the way back to my car I snapped this photo of a nice sewer grate – actually a storm drain, since Lansing did a huge project to separate their sanitary sewer from the stormwater drains around the time I moved to Lansing. I remember being unreasonably annoyed by it at the time, since it resulted in my closest bus stop being closed for a long time, and for a portion of that the second closest bus stop too, when I did most of my daily travel by bus. Also during that time the closest USPS mailbox to my house disappeared and was never put back when the construction was over. But, of course, I look back on it now and realize that my long walks were a small price to pay for the great environmental benefits of the sewer separation. I just wonder how people less able bodied than I, or with less free time to spend on walks, dealt with the loss of bus service.

I like the detailed fish (a trout, maybe) that serves to remind one of the harm done by dumping poison into the drain. There is also a small one at the bottom of the grate. This is the work of the East Jordan Iron Works, which you can read more about in a previous entry.

This drain is on the south side of West Michigan Avenue, at the southwest corner of Michigan and South Washington Square. I remember when this was just an intersection, but now it’s a traffic circle, and they put these giant ornaments (supplied by Bronner’s, the famed Christmas store in Frankenmuth) in the middle of it each year before Silver Bells.

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Hickory St., E.F. Sheets, 1963

Now, at the end of a several day run of Hickory Street stamps, I have gotten to my reason for walking that block. Not the stamp itself – E.F. Sheets stamps are common enough and I’ve covered them before in the blog – but the house it’s in front of. To explain why the house is significant, I have to back up a bit.

One of my major finds in the early days of the blog was a 1908 stamp from J.F. Sowa on Prospect Street. As I noted at the time, I was unable to find anything out about Sowa because of the confounding existence of another J.F. Sowa who had authored a notable book in computer science. It turns out there was another reason. I asked my mom if she could use her Ancestry.com membership to make a quick check for a J.F. Sowa in Lansing in the early 1900s. Mom went above and beyond and worked really hard on it, sending me frustrated updates from time to time. Then, at last, in an email titled “BINGO!!!” she reported finding him in the 1910 census: John Fred Sowa, born in 1862 in Prussia, immigrated in 1896, currently living on Hickory Street with his wife Minnie (formally Anna Wilhelmina, according to other sources). Here’s what made the search harder for both of us. Between the 1910 and 1920 census, he changed his surname’s spelling to Sova. This would have been more phonetic (in English) for the Polish and German pronunciation of Sowa. (I also wonder if he might have been the John Sovey mentioned in the famous article about the Bum Walks.)

Speaking of bum walks: sadly, and ironically, the sidewalk in front of Sowa’s house is in bad shape due to having subsided.

I then went to the city’s tax records look at the house it said he lived in, to see if it was still standing. Upon looking at the record, without exaggeration, I squealed with excitement. Someone with the last name Sova still owns the house! I don’t mean to sound like I am prying into the family’s business, but I am truly delighted that his family still has the house, and I wonder if they have any idea that a sidewalk in another neighborhood is still marked with their ancestor’s name. (Based on the names involved and other cursory research, I believe the current owner is a grandson of J.F.) While digging around, Mom communicated with another Ancestry user in Germany who is doing a family tree for Sowa’s wife’s family, and that person mentioned that Sowa showed up in the previous census at a different address on Hickory. He wondered if the street had been renumbered. I have another explanation. The house was only built in 1908, so wherever Sowa was living in 1900 could not have been this house. It seems that Sowa just liked Hickory Street, and evidently the Sovas still do. He must also have been doing well for himself since he seems to have moved into a brand new house.

J.F. Sowa’s house: staid but handsome in its way.

Ever since I found this out I’ve been meaning to make a pilgrimage to see the Sowa/Sova house, but it is just a bit far away for me to walk on my usual routes, so I kept putting it off. I finally stopped there, by car, on my way home from work. I was hoping so much that there would be an old Sowa stamp on this block, better yet in front of the house itself, but I didn’t find one. So I snapped a picture of the oldest stamp in front of the house, which sadly is only this one, from 1963. The house, by the way, is on the south side of Hickory between Euclid and Pennsylvania. It’s on a double lot and seems to have both a garage and a shed; I wonder how old the shed is and whether it might have been used in Sowa’s business.

Sowa/Sova died in 1934 at the age of 74, according to his stone in the Mount Hope Cemetery. It puts his birth year as 1859, which is slightly off the year given in the 1910 census, but I am pretty sure it is the same person.

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Hickory St., SFC, 2010

This is a new contractor for the blog, and one of the newest stamps on the block of Hickory Street between Euclid and Pennsylvania. The stamp is on the north side of the street. It’s very sharp looking, with a hollow-letter style that I appreciate. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to figure out who the contractor is. If you know, drop me a line.

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Hickory St., [Illegible] Stone Co., undated(?)

I love running across really old, really worn stamps like this, even if there is an element of frustration to it when they are illegible. I almost didn’t see this one because it is so worn that only someone really looking for it (like me) would probably notice it at all. I can just make out “Stone Co.” as probably the second line. If there had been a date, I don’t see any sign of it now. The first line is totally illegible. My first thought is is of the Lansing Artificial Stone Co., but it has a very different style from the one I have found from that company, and the illegible part also doesn’t look long enough.

Alas, it will not be giving up its secrets to me. This is a block of houses that date from the late 1890s to early 1900s, so I would guess that this is one of the original pieces of sidewalk here.