We finally had a little bit of snow (now long since obliterated by the weather turning warm again) and I took a walk in it to get photos of Christmas lights. I also found some beautiful snow-frosted sidewalk stamps. I love the way snow settles into the lettering; in some cases, as in the B.F. Churchill stamp below, it even makes it more legible.
A 1944 Department of Public Works stamp on Regent Street.
This 1908 B.F. Churchill stamp on Regent was one of the stamps that first motivated this blog. The extreme purple cast is due to a defective LED street light.
In honor of the holiday, here are some of the photos I took of Christmas lights on my walk. I have really come to enjoy walking alone in snowy quiet after night falls, stopping to stand in front of Christmas displays and admire them. Driving around to admire lights is nice, and I do that too, but there is something special about the intimacy of doing it on foot. Being a pedestrian is underrated.
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.
Recently my husband showed me a picture of this stamp, which he encountered on a walk. At first I thought it was the one on Bingham, which I had already covered, but when he said it was on Prospect Street, I set out to find it. It turned out to be a new one to me, mainly because it’s west of Pennsylvania and I rarely cross Pennsylvania on my walks. I had not walked past Eighth on Prospect before, and this stamp is on the south side of Prospect between Eighth and Hosmer.
It’s interesting to notice that the spacing of the date differs between this stamp and my previous J.P. Sleight 1908 stamp. Did they stamp each digit separately, or have two noticeably different date stamps?
This is a view west on Prospect. The stamp is too distant to make out, but it’s in front of the nearest visible house.
This walk is in good condition, the best of the J.P. Sleight walks I’ve found, so I hope it will remain here even if Mayor Schor is re-elected and fixes the sidewalks as promised.
On the southeast corner of Jerome and Ferguson Streets is a pair of V.D. Minnis stamps, around the corner from each other. I used to think all V.D. Minnis stamps were undated, until I found one dated ’07. Still, I took that one to be an odd exception, and the numerous undated ones to be a rule. I am reconsidering that in light of my close inspection of these stamps.
OK, so there’s a bit broken off the upper left corner. It’s probably at least 110 years old, I’d say it’s lasted pretty well. (Facing west on Jerome Street toward Ferguson.)
I noticed that both of them have a horizontal line underneath, which corresponds with the hyphen in the 1907 stamp (presumably separating the month and year, though the month had been obliterated from that one). I got down and under the yellow light of a street lamp I looked at it up close, and felt with my fingers. There are depressions on either side of the line, suggesting a worn-away month and year. After a bit more looking and feeling I suddenly thought (though it may be spurred by wishful thinking) that I could make out a very faint year: ’07. I am almost positive the first digit is a zero. It is in front of a 1904 house, so this might be from the first sidewalk that was laid when the subdivision was developed.
The stamp on Ferguson. OK, this one has more issues. Still, I hope I look this good when I’m 114.
A closer look at the Ferguson stamp.
I have a new theory about V.D. Minnis stamps, which is that they aren’t undated. The dates have just worn away in almost all cases. This might seem strange, except that the 1907 stamp on Regent Street shows a date that is shallower and cruder than the name, possibly due to being drawn in by hand.
This one is on the east side of South Pennsylvania Avenue just north of Prospect. I started to bypass it as I took it to be yet another very worn old V.D. Minnis stamp (I like those but don’t necessarily stop for all of them, plus they’re mostly undated), then I stopped and took another look and realized that it was something a lot rarer. Had this been the only one I had seen, it would have been illegible, but instead I recognized it as the second F.N. Rounsville stamp in my collection. The date is certainly in the aughts. In person I thought it looked like 09, but in the photo it looks like 08, which is the date on the other Rounsville stamp I found in the same neighborhood. I can’t make out a month this time.
The stamp is strangely off center. It makes me wonder if the sidewalk used to be wider here.
I’m glad I happened to see this one, because of the condition it’s in. It surely can’t last too much longer.
Looking north up Pennsylvania Avenue, from just north of the corner of Prospect Street.
What a beautiful day it was for a walk today, and what an interesting stamp I found, on the east side of Bingham Street just north of the corner of Prospect. Actually, I had seen this one before, but always at dusk when it wasn’t worth trying to photograph something so worn. Although it was daylight this time, I still couldn’t read the name, except that it ended with “-sville.” But the date is what really got my attention: 6-08, or June 1908.
At home, I showed the photo to my husband, on my small mobile screen. We both puzzled over it for some time. The first two letters were likely two initials. We both independently arrived at the idea that the last name started with an E and that the second letter might be a Q. I tried searching for various combinations based on that and found nothing. I set the project aside for dinner.
After dinner I brought the photo up again, but this time on my laptop screen. Immediately, out of the blue, a different name emerged and I realized I was looking at “Rounsville.” It’s funny how this happens sometimes. A search confirmed it. The Annual Report of the Board of State Auditors for the State of Michigan contains several estimates from F.N. Rounsville, in September 1903, for “cement walks surrounding blocks 78 and 79.” I don’t know what blocks those are, or how blocks were numbered at the time, but I do note that it’s the earliest reference I have yet found to sidewalks in Lansing.
More searching turned up some exciting connections to names that have graced this blog before. According to James McLean and Craig A. Whitford’sLansing: City on the Grand, 1836-1939(a book that has helped me with research before), F.N. Rounsville was Fred Rounsville:
Rounsville Market, established in 1891 on the corner of Cedar and Michigan. Fred N. Rounsville operated this market for ten years until starting J. Clear Company, later to be known as Rounsville Cartage, which he operated for 45 years. He was also associated with Jacob Sleight’s Artificial Stone Company and was a director of the Duplex Truck Company.
James McLean and Craig A. Whitford, Lansing: City on the Grand, 1836-1939, p. 37.
On July 12, 1973, the Lansing State Journal ran an article describing a walking tour of what they called Old North Lansing, better known today as Old Town. Among the historic properties described is 1017 North Washington: “Most famous as the former home of Fred Rounsville, the founder of the Rounsville Dray Lines and the Lansing Artificial Stone Co., the house is noteworthy for its gables, porch and steeply pitched roof.” I have checked out the house in Google Street View and it is indeed lovely. I will have to visit it in person sometime.
J.P. Sleight has appeared in the blog twice so far, for a 1907 and 1908 stamp. I have also featured a stamp from the Lansing Artificial Stone Co., which was eventually owned by J.P. Sleight. Based on my own research, the LSJ may be mistaken about Rounsville being the founder of the Lansing Artificial Stone Co. I don’t doubt that he had an association with it (I have found a lot of connections between early sidewalk contractors) but an 1880 history of Ingham and Eaton Counties by Samuel W. Durant states that the Lansing Artificial Stone Co. was founded by C.W. Stevens.
Sadly, this sidewalk is in very bad condition, with cracks like lightning striking through it. It is in front of a large and rather unusual-looking house on the corner of Bingham and Prospect, which according to the city’s property records was built in 1909. Directly across the street is the old L.F.D. No. 4 fire station. It’s a nice corner of the neighborhood, so why not visit this stamp before it has completely crumbled away?
Earlier today I told my husband that I was starting to doubt I would ever find a new “oldest” stamp. At least, I said, not as long as I keep walking in the same neighborhoods on the east side. I was beginning to think all the really interesting stamps had been mined out. That was 3 pm, this was 6:30 pm.
That’s 8-07, or August 1907.
This is on the west side of Custer Avenue between Michigan and Jerome, and may be the oldest dated stamp I’ve found. The fact that the earliest stamps usually include a month makes it possible for me to say that this is older than a previous record-holder, the October 1907 J.P. Sleight stamp on Jerome Street. I can’t know whether it is older or younger than the 1907 V.D. Minnis stamp on Regent Street because the date on that one is lost to time.
Still, while I’d have loved to see an undisputed new champion, this was my most exciting find in weeks, and it’s been right under my nose, on a street I frequently walk on. Apparently I have been in the habit of walking on the other side. I actually thought it was a V.D. Minnis stamp when I was coming toward it, since the style is quite similar.
Looking south on Custer Avenue. The stamp is on the nearest slab (only half visible, my fingers were cold and I didn’t have the patience to retake it).
At first I wasn’t able to find much about W.H. McKrill besides that he provided a testimonial for the Aladdin Company, a Bay City manufacturer of kit homes, in an advertisement in the March 1921 issue of Illustrated World magazine. Then I made a guess that W.H. might be a William, and that got me a very useful hit. The February 24, 1955, Lansing State Journal included a human interest piece: “Oldsters Vie for Honor: ‘Bill’ McKrill Beats Lewis J. Bugbee: Has Lived in Lansing 344 Days Longer.” Evidently, William McKrill turned up in the LSJ offices to complain because they had profiled Lewis J. Bugbee with the claim that he was “believed to be Lansing’s oldest son” when McKrill was older.
According to the article, William McKrill worked in the Bement factory until it closed about 1907, and then “later… entered the construction business and helped to build the first pavement on Michigan Avenue. For this he was paid $1.35 for a 10-hour day.” This initially made me think that he must be the very same W.H. McKrill, but then I became less certain. Would he really have gone straight from working at Bement to running his own paving business (and getting such an important job as paving Michigan Avenue) the same year? I wondered if William was instead a relative of W.H. and worked in the latter’s business. William’s father’s name did not begin with W, but it could have been some other relative. But I have found some evidence that W.H.’s wife was named Ida, which would indeed make W.H. the same person as the “Bill” in the above article. I know because of their grave in Mount Hope Cemetery. (William died the same year the article was published.)
One last tidbit about William, and I do know this is the same William based on the reference to his address (which I saw listed as the address of Ida in her obituary). According to the January 17, 1931, Lansing State Journal, he was arrested after having been found intoxicated while serving as a school traffic guard at the intersection of Bingham and Michigan. He must have been in a visibly bad state because the police were called by a nearby service station attendant who advised them that the crossing guard was in “no condition to take care of school traffic.” No doubt that crossing guard post served students going to Bingham Street School (the original one, not the 1950s replacement that used to be my polling place before being demolished in 2013).
This B.F. Churchill stamp is on the west side of the 200 block of Shepard Street, between Kalamazoo and Stanley Court. I have become convinced that both the Churchill stamps I have found are dated 1908 even though, as noted in my entry on the one on Regent Street, this doesn’t seem to make sense of the personal history of Churchill as I understand it. Both have a month as well as a year, something that seems more typical of the earliest stamps I have found. The “AP” of “APRIL” is very faint; I couldn’t see it in person, but with the contrast turned up a bit in this photo I can just make it out.
I’m hoping I may still find more B.F. Churchill stamps to give a greater sample of years.
Looking north on Shepard with the stamp visible in the closest block.
I had an exciting find tonight: another stamp from the aughts. I’m not sure how I haven’t noticed it before, since it’s quite a clear one and I often walk this street; I can only guess that it means I usually walk on the other side. It is on the north side of Prospect Street between Jones and Holmes (just east of Jones).
Trying to find out anything at all about the J.F. Sowa responsible for this stamp has been foiled by the fact that a person with the same leading initials and last name is an important personage in computer science. If I try for “J.F. Sowa” and “Lansing,” I get a lot of articles that include citations to Sowa alongside citations to other authors who happened to publish with Michigan State University Press. Adding “concrete” or “cement” to the name does not help, for reasons I will leave as an exercise to the reader. If I exclude the word “conceptual” in order to filter out results that refer to Sowa’s most cited book, Conceptual Structures, it does cut the results down to a handful, but none of what’s left is useful.
The J.F. Sowa stamp in context, looking west on Prospect Street.
The slab is in rough shape, covered in spidery cracks. Still, it’s impressive for it to have survived 112 years, and I think it is in the best condition of the pre-1910 stamps I have found. It looks to have received a neat patch at some point, which appeals to the part of me that enjoys darning socks.
Update 10/25/21: I learned a bit about J.F. Sowa with help from my mom, and wrote an update.
Before I started this blog, years before, I had already taken note of this stamp, on Regent Street between Kalamazoo and Michigan (the 300 block). It stands out for its old fashioned style and for the nicely styled arch. When I first saw it, I thought it said 1908 and was pleased to find one so old. I talked to my mother about it, and she looked up some information on Ancestry.com as she was a member there.
I had forgotten all about that since starting the blog, and when all the staring at the sidewalk brought it back to my attention several times the last few weeks I could no longer read it. Once again I thought I saw 1908, and once again got excited. But several times running I took photos of it and decided I just could not read the contractor’s name, so I put it aside.
Tonight I took my walk just at sunset, and the way the long shadows fell suddenly made the stamp legible. Sometimes evening shade works in my favor that way. That’s when I remembered, oh yes, B.F. Churchill! Didn’t I decide that it could not, after all, say 1908?
Searching my email found the old correspondence with my mother and, yes, that’s what I deduced then. B.F. Churchill (according to my mom’s research, his name was Byron) appeared in the advertisements for the 1916 Michigan Agricultural College (today’s MSU) yearbook as “College Drayman” and Mom found him in a 1916 Lansing city directory listed as “Proprietor, East Lansing Dray Line,” residence 138 Michigan Avenue, East Lansing. (There are no numbers that low on Michigan Avenue in East Lansing anymore as they seem to start in the 200 block, so I am not sure where that would have been. Perhaps near Mary Mayo hall?) By 1928 he was married and now worked for Reniger Construction. His residence at that time was 1623 Lyons Avenue, which is a cute house in the Baker-Donora neighborhood (built in 1908) that currently looks like it needs some TLC. In 1934 he appears in the directory with an unspecified address on Whipple Court and an occupation of “cement finisher.” I was puzzled by my inability to find Whipple Court on a map but found a site giving name changes of Lansing streets which advised me that Whipple Court was changed around 1940 to Alger. The houses on Alger mostly look too young to have been there in 1934.
From mom’s research, I had previously concluded that I must be misreading the date. I come to the same conclusion again, sadly, and suspect that the zero I’m seeing there is most likely a 3. I tentatively give this one a date of May 1938. (I wouldn’t rule out 1939, either.)
I have also found his death notice in the Lansing State Journal. He lived in Bath in his later years and died in 1964 at the age of 86. He is described as “a retired cement contractor.” It says he had lived in Clinton County for 35 years, which is puzzlingly inconsistent with his appearing in the Lansing city directory on Whipple in 1934. He is buried at Mount Rest Cemetery in St. Johns.
Update 9/30/20: I’ve becoming increasingly sure that it is, after all, 1908. I’m not sure how that makes sense of his history but that is really what my eyes see in it.
