I habitually watch the sidewalk when I’m walking around the neighborhood so that I can notice sidewalk stamps, but now that I’ve mined the east side so thoroughly, I’ve started to branch out and also look at any front walks I pass. Today I noticed these two stamps on the west side of South Foster Avenue between Michigan and Prospect.
The front walk is the closest (southernmost) one in this photo. A smaller path, leading presumably to the back of the house, is visible near the center of the photo.
There are two walks leading up to this house, one being the main front walk to the porch, and the other being a smaller path leading around to the back of the house. I noticed the one on the smaller path first and thought the date was 1937, but wasn’t entirely sure, as it could also have been 1987.
This is the northern stamp, on the smaller walk.
Then I saw the stamp on the front walk, which is a much clearer 1937. I can’t be totally sure they are from the same contractor, since they do look a bit different, but that might just be due to uneven wear. It seems likely they were done at the same time. They don’t date to the construction of the house; that was back in 1910.
This is the front walk (southern) stamp.
They are tantalizingly close to legible, but unfortunately I can only pick out a few letters.
I like two things about this front walk on the north side of Elizabeth Street between Shepard and Leslie: the very crisp, angled “1975” in either corner of the front step, and the way the walk forks instead of coming straight forward to the street.
I dislike just one thing about it: the lack of the contractor’s name.
I call this “undated” because I can’t make out a trace of a date marking, but it’s just as likely that it once had a date and it’s gotten worn away, as with other Minnis stamps. Anyway, this stamp reads (barely) “V.D. Minnis MFG Lansing” and is probably from sometime around the teens, since the Saga of the Bum Walks (1914) mentions V.D. Minnis as a city-approved (or disapproved in the case of Alderman Young) sidewalk contractor.
This stamp is on the north side of Hickory Street between Jones and Holmes.
This very worn Department of Public Works stamp is on the front walk of a house on the north side of Larned Street between Holmes and Jones. The last digit is a little hard to read but I think it’s 1926. Another DPW stamp across the street, similarly hard to read, I had previously decided was probably 1926, and stamps tend to come in clusters like that. The stamp is what I call the “first style” of DPW stamps, which were used from the teens through the forties.
What’s curious about this one is that it’s on a house’s front walk, not a public sidewalk. I have seen DPW stamps on driveway aprons before (presumably replaced during road or utility work) but this is the only one I have seen on a front walk. I am assuming it must have been damaged by utility work for the city to have gotten involved.
I found another J.F. Sowa stamp! I could hardly believe it, because it turned up in an area that I walk to all the time, on the west side of Bingham Street between Prospect and Kalamazoo. This is near the old fire station, which is one of my frequent destinations. As amazing as it seems to me, I must not have walked this side of the block south of Prospect before. I most often walk to the fire station by going west along Prospect Street, then head back home by either doubling back on Prospect or by going up Bingham to Eureka and turning around there. On this occasion, as there was a pretty sunset when I set out, I decided to take Kalamazoo west, which offers a better view of the sky. That resulted in my finding this stamp that has been hiding under my nose. When I got home I had to check my spreadsheet three times to be sure I had not catalogued this one before.
This one is exciting not just because of the early date, but because J.F. Sowa is one of the early contractors about whom I have been able to find the most information. He also is possibly referenced in the famous Saga of the Bum Walks. This stamp dates just two months after the only other one I have found (which is on Prospect near Jones), but it’s slightly different: the “C” marked between the name and date is not present on the earlier stamp.
Sad to say, it’s not in the best shape, though I’m happy it seems to have been repaired instead of replaced relatively recently.
This manhole cover is on the northeast corner of East Kalamazoo and Shepard Streets. There are several of this style around the neighborhood. When I first stopped to look at it, my brain was slow to make sense of the circular inscription; I could not readily orient myself to find the start and end of the word. Unfortunately it is just “ELECTRIC,” and there is no maker’s mark on this one.
This marking is on a driveway facing the sidewalk, on the west side of the 300 block of Regent Street, between Michigan and Kalamazoo. It’s visible enough to be intriguing, but not visible enough to read. There seem to be two lines of text, with the bottom one more visible.
Please excuse the bit of my fuzzy glove visible. It was a cold day.
The letters that can be most easily made out are “JAM” and I think the next two are “IE,” which made me think “Jamieson.” Unfortunately, that clue didn’t end up unlocking anything for me in my searches. The line above it looks to include “DDY,” but that’s not much to go on. But I have come to realize it is probably actually the names of people who lived in the house at one time: the bottom one is probably just plain Jamie, and perhaps the other one is “Daddy” or “Buddy.”
I could not see the handprints with my eyes at the time, but they have become visible in this photo, which makes it very clear this isn’t a contractor’s mark but a memento.
I found this stamp on the west side of North Clemens Avenue between Vine and Fernwood. It’s extremely worn, but I can tell it is probably one of those mysterious BdWL stamps. I never have been able to figure out who that is. The date is illegible.
I like this one because of how rugged the sidewalk is here, with all the individual stones showing through in different colors. It probably indicates how worn the sidewalk is, that it’s lost its smooth finish, but I like how it looks anyway. I like how non-uniform in appearance the sidewalks are, from different concrete mixes, different contractors’ styles, and different amounts of wear.
My walk last night, since I started out from somewhere other than home, found me walking past a building I have driven by countless times but never passed on foot before: Schep’s Garage on East Saginaw Street, on the southwest corner of Saginaw and Foster. It’s a building I really like, brick with little decorative crenellations. According to the city property records, it was built in 1931. It obviously used to be a gas station, and they haven’t even removed the old lights where the pumps presumably used to be.
I was hoping to collect an interesting old sidewalk stamp in front of it, but there really weren’t any. I did find this marking, which is oriented so that it is right side up to a someone facing the business, i.e. sideways compared with most contractor stamps. It’s illegible except for a letter P, and I can’t tell whether it was a contractor’s mark or graffiti, though it looks more like the latter.
The marking isn’t visible here; it’s below and to the left of view.
State Journal advertisements of the 1940s place Pete Bailey’s Hi Speed Service in this location. An ad on April 15, 1940, says “Visit Our New Station Ionia and Capitol or Our Old Station at 2320 E. Saginaw St.” Bailey’s was probably the original occupant of the Schep’s building because on October 30, 1950, an ad in the State Journal reads, “FLOYD ‘PETE’ BAILEY Bailey High Speed Service 2320 E. Saginaw St., is observing its 18th year in service to the Lansing community. The firm, operated by Mr. Bailey, provides a complete mechanical service, including repair of ignition, tires, motor tune-ups, and repair and adjustment of brakes. Other services include lubrication, battery charging, and towing service. The firm also sells all Hi-Speed products, gasoline and oil, new tires and batteries.” The last reference to Bailey’s I can find is an ad on February 5, 1951.
Schep’s Garage’s Web site regrettably does not have a company history, but the earliest reference I can find to Schep’s is an advertisement in the State Journal on January 1, 1985. What was in the Schep’s building between the 1950s and 1980s is a mystery to me.
This is almost certainly a contractor’s stamp, but it’s hopelessly illegible. The size, shape, and placement are reminiscent of the “second style” of Lansing DPW stamps, but I don’t think it is one. The only letter I think I can make out – maybe – looks like an M. It might be the first letter, but that’s not clear. In any case, the letters that can be made out do not seem to fit with the “Lansing DPW” mark.
A closeup of the stamp.
The stamp is on the east side of South Hayford Avenue between Michigan and Prospect, in the 100 block.
