Posted on by bunnyhugger

Ford Meter Box Co. water meter cover, E. Michigan Ave.

I noticed this handsome water meter cover on the south side of East Michigan Avenue between Magnolia and Hayford, in front of the vacant lot next to the old Hotwater Works building.

The company is the Ford Meter Box Co., so I assume Wabash Box is the name of a model. (Wikipedia’s entry for Ford has a picture of an even handsomer meter cover with “Crescent Box” on it instead.) The Ford Meter Box Co. started in 1898 and is still around and still located in Wabash, Indiana. And it turns out that the founder, Edwin Ford, was not just a meter box seller – he was the inventor of the in-ground outdoor water meter.

Posted on by bunnyhugger

Marshall St., Bingham & Taylor water meter lid

I’ve already branched out into manhole covers, so why not wander further afield? Here is a water meter cover from Bingham & Taylor, a Virginia-based business that manufactures water and gas utility supplies.

It’s out in front of the Light Mission Pentecostal Church on the east side of Marshall Street between Jerome and the Armory.

The church was home to Unity of Greater Lansing from 1968 to 2012. The city’s online records don’t have the date it was built, but the parsonage next door (which was sold by Unity and is now just a private residence) was built in 1957 so I would guess a similar date for the church. It has a 1950s look to it, anyway.