Tonight I’m returning to the E.M. Vannocker driveway apron from the west side of Shepard Street between Marcus and Elizabeth. The reason for this return visit is that I realized on a later walk that it is not just one stamp but a series of three. The first three houses south of Marcus all have this stamp in their driveway apron, yet I haven’t found one anywhere else yet.
I expected to find that all three houses were built at the same time, but sadly it wasn’t as neat as that. From north to south, they were built in 1924, 1923, and 1926. The ’24 and ’23 houses are similar, possibly identical, bungalows. The ’26 house is an American foursquare. Perhaps Vannocker was the builder of all of these houses, or someone the builder worked with regularly.
This one caught my eye during my evening walk. (I have been walking after dark a lot lately, partly because I enjoy finding new Christmas lights to look at, and partly because it’s hard not to with the days so short.) It’s on the west side of Shepard Street between Marcus and Elizabeth. The flash photo got it really well, with a bit of help from the wet pavement; there was a misting rain. There were neighbors out on their porch. I keep wondering when I’m going to get the police called on me.
Anyway, this one grabbed my attention because it looked old, so I took a photo despite not usually doing driveway aprons. (I actually thought this was my first driveway apron stamp, but checking my spreadsheet I found that I had done one once before.) The “LANSING MICH” especially connects it with older stamps I have found. The house it is in front of was built in 1924, so I would guess this was poured then.
I had a hard time finding out anything about E.M. Vannocker. Searching Find A Grave, I found an Everett M. Vannocker who lived 1872-1938, probably the correct time frame, but he was buried in Six Lakes, Michigan (a town I previously did not know existed, though it is fairly close to Mount Pleasant, where I work). Because of that I almost ruled him out, but then I found a couple of references in the Lansing State Journal society pages of the 1930s to a Mrs. Everett Vannocker, one of which also gives the name of a daughter, Elsie. The Find A Grave record also gives Mr. Vannocker a daughter named Elsie. From this I infer that Everett M. Vannocker probably did live in Lansing at least during the 1930s, and may have been the E.M. Vannocker of this stamp.
An overview of the driveway apron. As you can see, it’s suffered some damage over the years.
