Ever since I saw the first one of these fire alarm/telegraph covers recently, suddenly I’m seeing there everywhere. I should start plotting them on a map and see if I can tell from that where the telegraph lines went. This one is half buried in mud at the moment and resides at the southeast corner of South Hayford Avenue and Kalamazoo Street.
I was walking past this telegraph/fire alarm utility cover on the northeast corner of South Hayford Avenue and Elizabeth Street, and I decided to try kicking dirt off it in order to read the rest of the manufacturer’s name.
It’s hard to see in the photo, but I was able to determine that the outer edge reads “Capital Casting Co., Lansing Michigan.” According to OpenCorporates, the Capital Casting Company was incorporated in 1905 and dissolved in 1986. Its registered address is given as 6869 West Grand River Avenue, which (if the numbering is the same) would be in the vicinity of the Capital Area Humane Society today. An article from the May 8, 1938, State Journal titled “Lansing has 65 little industries-from guns to automobile,” which Timothy Bowman has republished in his highly recommended local history blog, instead gives its address as 500 South Hosmer Street. Today that address belongs to Lansing Flooring Supplies, but the building is newer. A similar article on local industries from the February 4, 1973, State Journal does not mention Capital Casting.
Found another fire alarm and telegraph utility cover! This one is at the southwest corner of Prospect and South Holmes Streets.
More of the outer rim is visible on this one, but it’s still partly obscured. That’s too bad, since it apparently gives the maker’s name: “[Illegible] Co., Lansing, Michigan.” Maybe if I brought a garden trowel…
This isn’t a sidewalk stamp and this time I don’t even have the excuse of it being on the sidewalk – it’s on the lawn extension (parkway, right of way, whatever you like to call it) at the northeast corner of Hayford Avenue and Elizabeth Street. It was just too cool not to share.
