I have a silly (and unfortunately blurry) one for you today. Eastlund Concrete stamps are ubiquitous in the neighborhood, but apparently they failed to get a new date stamp for 2023. The 2 has been rubbed out and replaced with a handwritten 3.
This one is on the west side of North Clemens Avenue between Fernwood and Saginaw, in front of a cute little house that looks like it got some new walk at the same time as a revamped front walk.
I assume this is graffiti, though the name/date format and the placement almost suggests a handwritten contractor marking. But, for Little Christmas, please enjoy the well-lit house I found it in front of. It’s on the west side of North Hayford Avenue between Fernwood and Saginaw.
On a pleasant early-afternoon walk in search of Halloween decorations, I came across these stamps from a contractor I haven’t noticed before. They are on the west side of Kipling Boulevard between Lasalle and Fernwood. There are two, a short distance apart, which means they probably marked the beginning and end of a section of new concrete.
One of the stamps has a date stamped underneath, though faintly enough that I thought it was undated until I looked at my photo afterward. My phone tends to put a lot of contrast on photos and that popped it out. Curiously, the other stamp has a much clearer but handwritten date.
I don’t know anything about Brown Construction, but I wonder if it is this contractor in Grand Ledge that Yelp reports as closed.
Here’s another one that has been hiding from me in a spot I’ve traveled often enough. I think I can see why: it’s quite worn and probably visible only in good light. It’s on the east side of Lathrop Street, south of Elizabeth.
I have only found one other stamp by this contractor, so this is a rare one. XMC is, by my best guess, short for <guitar-lick>Xtreme Mason Contractors</guitar-lick>, a contractor from Laingsburg. The last digit of the date is a little uncertain but my best guess is that it’s a 2.
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.
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.
These handwritten stamps are a little way up the street from the handwritten C.H. Peel, but in this case I can be quite confident they are contractor’s marks from the fact that there are two of them paired on either end of a stretch of sidewalk, as a contractor would do to mark the beginning and end of the work they were responsible for. This is on the west side of the 400 block of Leslie Street between Kalamazoo and Elizabeth.
In these (not very good) photos it is hard to tell that the first letter is a C, but I’ve seen it by daylight and know that it is. My usual tricks didn’t bring me any joy. I couldn’t find out anything at all about C. Fletcher.
This handwritten mark is on the west side of Leslie Street’s 500 block, between Kalamazoo and Elizabeth. Is it a contractor’s mark, or graffiti? It could easily be either, but guess is the former, based on its placement.
I can’t seem to find out anything about C.H. Peel, either as a contractor or as a person, but my guess is that this is either Charles Hubert Peel or his son Charles H. Peel Jr. Both lived (and died) in Lansing according to Find A Grave, and both were plausible ages in 1961. The father lived 1907-1988 and the son lived 1932-1988. Sadly, they died close together, first Charles Jr. in May 1988 and then Charles Sr. in November that year.
It’s not clear whether this stamp on the west side of Shepard Street (south of Elizabeth, before the I-496 dead end) is a contractor’s mark or graffiti. It’s done so crudely that I’d be inclined to say graffiti, except that it reminds me of this handwritten L. Miller stamp, which I have reason to believe is a contractor’s mark. The last name is definitely Wagner. The first name is rather obscure but might be Dan or Dave.
I can’t find anything about a contractor named Wagner working in the area in the right sort of time period, so if this is a contractor’s stamp it’s a mysterious one.
This fortunately well-lit stamp is on the south side of Prospect Street between Pennsylvania and Eighth. There are a pair of them, and they appear to be handwritten. I had noticed this one before and found it curious, as X is an uncommon initial to appear in a contractor stamp.
I assumed it was a given name such as Xavier. Instead I have discovered that this is most likely the mark of Xtreme Mason Contractors of Laingsburg. Their slogan is “Xtreme Masonry: Fortified with Hell Bricks!”1
OK, no it isn’t. Their Web site says they are a 100% women-owned business, which might be a first for the blog, and that they specialize in commercial masonry repair and historic building restoration. They were founded in 2005.
1 I borrowed this joke from a Zippy the Pinhead comic from, I think, the late 1990s. I wish I could find it again. It involves a discussion of things being promoted as “extreme” and ends with Zippy declaring, “Extreme Oreos! Fortified with hell sugar!”
Today’s stamps are kitty-corner to each other on the northwest corner of North Magnolia Avenue and Vine Street, meaning that one is really on Magnolia and the other on Vine.
H. Plummer can be found advertising concrete work in late 1960s and early 1970s Lansing State Journal classifieds pages. It turns out his name was Henderson Plummer and he lived in Mason, that is, when he lived in Michigan. He seems to have spent at least some of his time in Texas. While trying to find more about him, in hope of turning up a history of his contracting business, I found some pictures of apparent relatives, and was surprised to discover that they were Black and thus he probably was too. I say surprised because so far whenever I have managed to turn up a picture of a contractor featured in the blog it has been a White man. So, it is nice to find some diversity in the business. (I will also be very excited if I ever find a woman, but I’m not holding my breath in the meantime.)
I haven’t found much about Plummer, but I did find this page from a Plummer family reunion newsletter in which he gets a brief mention in “Notes of Interest”:
Henderson Plummer will complete his tour of duty in Texas, where he works on the toll-road in Houston. He will return to his extensive contractor business in Michigan where his family resides.
Reunion News, June 23, 1987, p. 7.
The reference to the contractor business gives me confidence that it is the same Henderson Plummer who had a concrete business in Mason and who poured this sidewalk.
