premoe – Capital City Sidewalks

Posted on October 11, 2022 by bunnyhugger

W. Lake Lansing Rd., E.R. Premoe, 1987

I more or less randomly picked a new neighborhood to look at today, mainly because it was on my way home from work. Originally I wanted to see if there was anything interesting on Harrison near West Lake Lansing Road, but on my way there I happened to see a cul-de-sac I hadn’t noticed before. Its dead end is so close to the south side of Lake Lansing that they almost intersect. I made the next turn and wove my way through seemingly endless meandering subdivision streets until I eventually found my way back to it. It turns out to be Rollingbrook Lane. I walked around near the end of it a little, but the only stamps I found were several 2007 Able stamps. They were on obvious replacement slabs. Most of the neighborhood, however, had the pebblier style of concrete I’ve come to associate with midcentury stamps. Disappointed, I walked up to Lake Lansing Road to see if I could find anything interesting there.

There I found an older stamp from E.R. Premoe (and lots more Able 2007), but nothing too interesting. I did get a nice sunset view of the Coolidge Court strip mall and its modernist architecture. Though Rollingbrook does not intersect Lake Lansing as far as cars are concerned, the two streets do have a corner – a sidewalk corner.

Posted on July 31, 2021 by bunnyhugger

Leslie St., E.R. Premoe, 1988

I found this nice example of an E.R. Premoe stamp, and a less nice amount of broken glass, on the sidewalk on the east side of Leslie Street between Elizabeth and the dead end above I-496.

The stamp is in front of a vacant lot. The house on the lot was demolished in 2014.

Posted on January 26, 2021 by bunnyhugger

Rumsey Ave., E.R. Premoe, 1997

These stamps are on Rumsey Avenue just north of Michigan, alongside the Church of the Resurrection complex. There are one or two more E.R. Premoe stamps along that stretch besides these, but my hands were getting cold.

This stamp is on the front walk of the building rather than the public sidewalk.

This is a plainer stamp than the other E.R. Premoe version, though the tradeoff is that it is easier to read. The date shows that the business continued on for a good while after the death of Earl R. “Lefty” Premoe.

The corner of Michigan and Rumsey. This is one of the buildings of the Church of the Resurrection complex.

This stamp is on the public sidewalk further north on Rumsey.

Another stamp further north yet, also alongside the Church’s property.

Posted on January 12, 2021January 12, 2021 by bunnyhugger

Rumsey Ave., E.R. Premoe, 198(?)

This pair of E.R. Premoe stamps is on the east side of Rumsey Avenue between Michigan and Jerome. Unfortunately I can’t quite make out the last number of the date. It is probably 1980s and I think it could be 1983. I’ll have to try it again in better light and see if that helps.

Luckily for me, someone who (unlike me) actually has a subscription to Newspapers.com has been assembling clippings of the Premo(e) family. (It appears that the family is split on how to spell it.) E.R. Premoe, according to his obituary, was Earl R. “Lefty” Premoe. He was from Lansing, and died in 1989. It says that he ran the E.R. Premoe Construction company 25 years. According to OpenCorporates, it was incorporated in 1965. That seems a little inconsistent with his obituary saying he ran it 25 years, but it’s possible that it existed in some form for a while before its incorporation. Most likely they just wanted to round off the figure. In 1986, the E.R. Premoe company received an award from the General Contractors of America for having lost no work days due to accident or injury.

And here’s the southern stamp. Unfortunately they both have an unclear date.

This is a favorite neighborhood for me to walk in because the residents had, and still have, a lot of Christmas lights up. Before that, there were a lot of Halloween decorations. I’m going to miss seeing lights on people’s houses at night, but I think people are going to continue being slow to take them down, so I have a while left.