USA > Michigan > Wayne County > Detroit > The city of Detroit, Michigan, 1701-1922, Vol. I > Part 38
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In 1850, John Palmer and others residing near the square petitioned the couneil to have the Campus graded, feneed and ornamented with shade trees. The committee of the council made a report July 9, 1850, recommending that the prayer be granted. The city had leased this corner to a eireus company for one day in 1849 and had received $100 for the use of the ground and the license. The money was now authorized to be expended in leveling the ground and there was added to it a like sum subseribed by John Palmer and other neighbors and another hundred dollars taken from the road fund. The transformation must have been startling, for the "Free Press" of August 2, 1851, said regarding it: "The Campus Martius makes quite an appearance with its young trees and its oat erop springing up fresh and green among the brieks and mortar sur- roundings. A similar disposition of the area on the opposite side of the street towards the city hall would be a good idea. It would make Woodward Avenue one of the pleasantest, as it is now one of the busiest and most important thorough- fares of the city."
The property was not cared for and the council, in 1851, found that "but one chain had been placed through the posts around the Campus Martius, and the same is now left exposed, so that the cattle and other animals are destroying the improvements made by the city appropriation."
The trees and grass were short-lived among the brieks and mortar and in 1853 the "Advertiser" said: "The Campus Martius looks very forlorn. The supposed shade trees are only poles, and the only green thing on the square is a big dock weed," so the city leased the corner to the railroad eireus for an exhibi- tion in September of that year. In June, 1854, the same circus company paid the city $250 for a three days' lease of the lot.
The present city hall itself was a long time in contemplation. As early as 1857, committees on almshouse and public buildings jointly reported in favor of so amending the charter "that the bonds of the city may be issued for such a sum of money as must be required to build such publie buildings for said purpose, as this council shall deem expedient, for the purpose of constituting a fund, to be used for the purpose of erecting publie buildings in the city; namely, an alms- house, a city jail, a city hall and such other public buildings as may be deemed necessary." The recommendation was adopted and the amendment to the charter was made by the legislature. Two years later the subject of a city hall was taken up as a separate proposition and at the last of a series of meetings the controller, James M. Edmunds, submitted a definite plan for a building upon the following basis: "The basement will contain heating apparatus, coal rooms, store rooms, water closets, ete. The first floor will contain eight offiees, two rooms and a vault, each office containing 448 square feet floor surface; one office with a floor surface of 525 square feet, two halls each twenty feet wide, erossing at right angles in the center, making a public entrance on each of the four fronts.
"The second floor will contain four offices, two rooms and vault, each office
OLD AND NEW CITY HALLS
REMOVAL FROM OLD CITY HALL IN 1872
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having a floor space of 821 or more fect; three offices, two rooms and a vault, one committee room, one council chamber 60 x 90 feet, the halls of the same width as on the first floor.
"The third floor will contain one circuit court room, with 5,400 square feet of surface; one supreme court room, with 2,400 square feet of surface, two judges' consultation rooms, two attorneys' consultation rooms, one library, two jury rooms, one sheriff's room.
"The building to be constructed of hewn stone and fire proof. The elevation to be massive and attractive, and on whatever location it may be placed, the building and entire grounds to occupy one entire block, that it may present four fronts, and a public entrance on each front."
This plan was strikingly similar to the one that was actually adopted a dozen years later. The estimated cost of the building was $250,000, and the common council authorized the issue of bonds for that amount. The proposed site was then a part of the Campus Martius. The steps necessary to vacate it for the purpose of the building, the competitive submission and examination of plans and other preliminaries filled up the time until the spring of 1861, when the Civil war commenced and building operations of this kind were suspended. The subject was taken up again in the summer of 1865, but it was not until the fall of 1866 that a contract for the excavation was let. The final plans for the structure were drawn by the architect, James Anderson, and in 1867 the contract for the building was let to N. Osborn & Company of Rochester, New York, for $379,578. Their contract called for the completion of the building July 1, 1871, and they fulfilled it and had two months to spare. The city gave them a bonus of $3,000 for the privilege of occupying the building earlier than the time called for. This was done as a measure of economy and for the convenience of the county, which was required to vacate other quarters. Of the result one of the local papers said at the time: "The contractors, Messrs. Osborn & Company, are entitled to great praise, not only for the promptness with which they have done their work, but for the manner in which they have done it. It is conceded on all hands, that every stone and brick has been laid in a conscientious and faithful manner. Those who have watched the building closely pronounce it a first-class piece of work, and really the structure speaks for itself, both to the credit of the taste of the designer and the skill and honesty of the builder." The building is 204 feet long and 90 feet wide. The height of the building to the cornice is 66 feet and to the top of the flagstaff 200 feet. The walls are constructed of Amherst sandstone, quarried near Cleveland, Ohio. Some re- modeling was done upon the city hall in 1906.
It was also matter of comment that not only was the building completed within the specified time, but within the stipulated cost, and that without a suspicion of fraud or graft. This constructive work was going on at the same time as that on the New York City courthouse, made infamous by the frauds of Tweed, Sweeney & Ingersoll, and the contrast between the two records was matter of bitter comment in the New York press. The estimated value of the land upon which the building stood was $195,000. The total cost of the build- ing, including the plans, excavation, structure, heating apparatus, clock and bell was $519,949. Furniture, ornamenting the grounds, interest on bonds, printing and other incidentals added $82,181 to this, making a total cost, exclusive of grounds, of $602,130. The corner stone was laid August 6, 1868, with an address by Charles I. Walker. The building was dedicated July 4, 1871, the council
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held their first meeting therein on the 1Sth, and for the half century since then it has been one of the busiest and most useful structures in the city.
Other items of interest concerning the city hall follow. The four stone figures on the first section of the tower are each 14 feet in height and represent Justice, Industry, Art, and Commerce. In 1884, Bela Hubbard commissioned the sculptor, Julius Melchers, to make four statues, of Cadillac, La Salle, Father Marquette and Rey. Fr. Gabriel Richard, which he presented to the city and they were placed in niches on the east and west fronts of the city hall. The bell in the tower, weighing 7,670 pounds, cost $2,782. The clock cost $2,850, has four dials each 8 feet 3 inches in diameter, and the mechanism was first started July 4, 1871. The two cannon on each side of the front steps on the east were captured from the British at the battle of Lake Erie, when Perry routed the English fleet under Barclay. These pieces were brought here from Erie, Pennsylvania, placed on the old government wharf between Wayne and Cass, then served as posts to which to tie vessels, but were later secured for the city by private subscription and gift in April, 1872, the larger by the citizens, on the 12th, and the other by Moore, Foote & Company, on the 17th, and on July 4, 1874, they were placed in their present position.
Built originally to accommodate both city and county, the building has now become inadequate to the needs of the city alone. The city courts and many of the county offices are accommodated in the five-story Municipal Courts Building, corner of St. Antoine and Macomb, which was completed and occupied in 1917 and which cost $845,000. The board of health and public welfare com- mission occupy a separate building at St. Antoine and Clinton Streets. The department of buildings and safety engineering has the larger part of a re- modeled old court building erected in 1889 at Clinton and Raynor Streets, and there are several other officials and commissions scattered throughout the city.
THE GOVERNMENT BUSINESS
The co-partnership existing between the Government of the United States and the people of the City of Detroit is a firm which does business that, in actual dollars and cents, is far greater than any of the members of this unique firm would conceive in his own judgment. The exports and imports which appear on the books of the customs office; the tonnage registers and the inspections and examinations which are connected with the lake marine; the marine hospital, the river and harbor improvements and the lighthouse service which are directed from this port; the internal revenue collections for the district of which Detroit is the center, and to which it is the main contributor; the postoffice business, which comes in direct touch with almost every resident; the military service connected with the establishment at Fort Wayne; the United States courts which adjudicate, not only the ordinary court cases for the eastern district of Michigan, but some of the most important admiralty cases that ever come up on the lakes; all these represent business that touches the citizen at many points. All of this business has to be housed, but it is a noticeable fact that the housing accommodations have almost always been short of the requirements. The transportation of mail, from the day of the lone messenger footing it overland to the day of the fast train and airplane, has scarcely kept pace with the needs of the service.
Prior to January 1, 1803, no postoffice existed in Detroit. The mail, both going and coming, was an intermittent affair, depending upon the overland
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carrier, the weather and seasons and many other conditions. Letter writing was not a common practice in the old days: in fact, to be able to read and write was an unmistakable sign that one was wealthy and educated. We note in other chapters of this work the lack of schools and the customary procedure of the common people in signing wills, deeds and other documents by a cross- mark. The post commandant, and some of the officers, the leading merchants, and better social elass were the only ones who indulged in the luxury of letters, and they found the service very tardy and exasperating. At the time of the Pontiac siege (1763), mail ordinarily required from two to three weeks between Detroit and Niagara. Indians were very often employed as mail runners, going in pairs, sometimes with an interpreter, and their speed depended in great measure upon the amount of rum promised them at their destination.
During De Peyster's term as commandant under the British rule, and after the Revolutionary War, some semblance of an orderly mail service was operated. Three months was the ordinary time for a letter to reach Detroit from Quebec.
The first post road in Michigan, part of a line from Detroit to Cincinnati, was opened in March, 1801, but discontinued three years later, when a road from Cleveland to Detroit was established. A mail service with Washington was inaugurated in 1802 and ten years later the mail required forty days to reach the Capital City from Detroit. During the early years of the Nineteenth Century, the mails were very poorly operated. Excerpts from letters written by Governor Lewis Cass to the postal authorities at Washington give some hints of the condition of affairs at this time. In December, 1815, he wrote:
"At all times since our arrival at this place in 1813, the mail has been carried with singular irregularity-an irregularity for which the state of the roads will furnish no excuse. I passed the mail carrier last summer between the mouth of the Raisin and Mansfield. He was on foot, and I should say not fit to be trusted with sixpence."
On December 30, 1815, Cass again wrote:
"The post-rider has just arrived without a letter or paper. Our last National Intelligencer is November 7. The last mail brought me a letter from the War Department, of October 30 * * * The misconduct is with the postmaster at Cleveland. Mr. Abbott informs me that this postmaster, if the mail from Pittsburgh arrives five minutes after he has closed the mail for this place, will not forward, but retains it until the next week *
* Cut off as we are from the world and from other means of information than the mail, we look with eagerness for its arrival, and nine times out of ten we find ourselves dis- appointed."
Cass continued to report the inefficiency of the mails to Washington. Little improvement was noted, however, although some attempt was made to move official mail with a bit of regularity.
By 1817 an important innovation was introduced into the postal service. The post-boy was equipped with a horn. The inhabitants listened for the sound of this horn on mail days and its first note was the signal for a general scurrying to meet the post-rider.
The second post-road in the territory was established in May, 1820, running between Detroit and Mt. Clemens via Pontiac. A road to Saginaw was opened in 1823 and to Ann Arbor and Fort Gratiot five years later. In 1827 the first mail stages began running to Ohio, and in 1830 a daily southern and eastern mail, by way of Pittsburgh, started. Mail was yet slow, however, as a letter
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required two weeks to reach New York from this place. Ten years later this time had been shortened to about nine days. Postal rates varied according to distance during the early days. A letter traveling thirty miles was carried for six or eight cents at different times, and the price varied until for a distance of 450 or 500 miles the rate was twenty-five cents. Postage stamps did not come into use until 1847 and the Free Press of August 16, 1847, carried an item as follows:
"Post office stamps have been received at the office in this city from the Department, for the prepayment of postage. They are of two denominations, five and ten cents, and will be a great accommodation to the public. All that has to be done is to prefix one of the little appendages, and the letter goes direct."
These stamps in 1861, during the silver shortage, were freely used as cur- reney. Postal cards were not used in Detroit until 1873. Envelopes were first used in 1839. Before their advent, the letter paper was folded together and sealed. Money orders were first issued from the Detroit office November 1, 1864. and the system of registering letters began in 1855. Free mail delivery by carriers was started in Detroit in October, 1864.
The postmasters of the Detroit office, and the year of their appointment, follow: Charles Curry was the first postmaster at Detroit, but the date of his appointment is indefinite. There exists in the Burton Historical Collection a letter to Curry from the postmaster-general, acknowledging receipt of $56.25, his account for the quarter ending June 30, 1803; Frederick Bates, 1803; George Hoffman, 1806; James Abbott, 1806: John Norvell, 1831; Sheldon MeKnight, 1836: Thomas Rowland, 1842; John S. Bagg, 1845; Alpheus S. Williams, 1849; Thornton F. Brodhead, 1853; Cornelius O'Flynn, 1857; Henry N. Walker, 1859; Alexander W. Buel, 1860; William A. Howard, 1861; Henry Barns, 1866; Fred- erick W. Swift, 1867; John H. Kaple, 1875: George C. Codd, 1879; Alexander W. Copland, 1886; George R. Woolfenden (aeting); Elwood T. Hance, 1SS9; John J. Enright, 1893; Freeman B. Diekerson, 1897; Homer Warren, 1906; William J. Nagel, 1913 -.
The postoffice itself was a movable institution, located at the place which was most convenient to the postmaster for the time being. The locations of the office have been numerous. According to Farmer's History of Detroit the first known location was under Abbott, when it was housed in a log building on the southwest corner of Woodward Avenue and Woodbridge Street, and in 1831 moved to a brick building on the south side of Jefferson Avenue below Wayne Street; following this it was, in 1831, again located at the northeast corner of Jefferson and Shelby; in 1834 at another location in the same block; in 1836 was moved to 157 Jefferson, near Randolph; later in the year moved to north- east corner of Jefferson and Shelby; in 1837 moved to 105 Jefferson; in 1840 located in a brick building farther west in the same block; in 1843 established in the basement of a stone building on the southwest corner of Jefferson and Griswold; and in 1849 was opened on the first floor of the Mariners' Church, northwest corner of Woodward and Woodbridge. Here it remained until the first postoffice building was constructed. Part of the time the postoffice was in one building, the customs office in another and the United States courts in a third. They were never brought together in a Government owned structure until 1860, when the building at the northwest corner of Griswold and Larned was opened.
The subject of building a postoffice in Detroit for the use of the department
OLD POST OFFICE AND U. S. CUSTOM HOUSE
EXCAVATION FOR OLD POST OFFICE ON GRISWOLD AND LARNED This is one of the oldest Detroit photographs extant, taken in 1857.
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and for holding courts was agitated for some years, but the first appropriation of money was made August 4, 1854. The property was sold to the Government on November 13, 1855, by Mrs. Henry Barnard for $24,000. Ground was broken for the new building in August, 1857, and the corner stone was laid May 18, 1858 by ex-Governor William M. Fenton, grand master of grand lodge, F. & A. M. The roof was put on in May, 1859, and the building was first opened for business at noon, January 30, 1860. The Government was nearly six years in buying the site and erecting the building. Henry N. Walker was the post- master at this time. The building cost $162,800, in addition to the cost of the site. A. H. Jordan was the architect. This building served its original purpose for over thirty years and still houses a number of Government offices.
The story of the site of this old postoffice building is an interesting onc. The military reservation was that part of the old town lying between Jefferson and Michigan Avenues, Griswold and Cass Streets. It was reserved for the use of the military department in 1809 and was donated to the city by the war department in 1826. The fort was at that time destroyed and the lands turned over to the city government.
The first plat of the military reservation designated the lots on the northwest corner of Larned and Griswold Streets by the numbers, 18, 19 and 20, each lot fronting fifty feet on the north side of Larned Street. At this time Griswold Street was only fifty feet wide. When it was decided to make the street ninety feet wide, as it is at present, a new plan was made and the lots faced Griswold Street and were numbered 1, 2 and 3. These are the lots on which the old postoffice building is located. This land was at one time designated as a site for the city hall, but the plan to build here was not carried out and the city, being the owner of the land, offered it to the Methodist Church Society in exchange for their Farrar Street property. The proposal to make the trade was submitted by the mayor, John Biddle, and Aldermen Peter J. Desnoyers and Jerry Dean, as a committee of the common council, but no trade could be effected.
The lots were sold after this failure to trade to Francis P. Browning in 1832. Mr. Browning was a very prominent merchant of his time and engaged in many enterprises. Perhaps the most important was that of carrying on an extensive sawmill at the foot of Woodward Avenue. It was the time when log houses, in the city, were going out of vogue and the making of lumber for frame houses was a very important occupation. Mr. Browning and his associates were exten- sively engaged in cutting pine timber at the "pinery" on the Black River and on the St. Clair River in the vicinity of the present City of Port Huron, and floating it down the river to Detroit to be made over into more valuable building material. Mr. Browning was considered a man of large means for his time and it was quite proper that he should become the owner of the land above described, that he might erect a fine residence suitable alike to the location, the finest residence district of the city, and to himself as one of the foremost citizens. A two-story brick residence was soon erected on the land, but Mr. Browning occupied it only a little more than a year, when he sold to Peter J. Desnoyers, March 14, 1834, for $8,000. A few months later the city was visited by the Asiatic cholera and one of the victims of the pestilence was Frances P. Browning.
Mr. Desnoyers occupied the property with his family until his sudden death in 1846. In the partition of his estate, August 31, 1847, the property passed Fol. 1-24
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to his daughter, Josephine S. Desnoyers. Miss Desnoyers married Henry Barnard, who was a prominent educator and for some years superintendent of education in Massachusetts. As stated before, the Government received the property from Mrs. Barnard.
The present ornate and imposing Federal Building was more than three decades in the making. The first appropriation for it was voted by Congress in May, 1882, $600,000, if a new site was purchased and $500,000 if the old site was used. Six months later a government commission reported in favor of utilizing the old site. This calamity was happily averted, though it took long discussion and vigorous protests to accomplish that. The old site was in the lowest ground in that section, close by the bed of the old Savoyard Creek, and entirely inadequate for the uses for which it was intended. A second commission selected the south half of the block bounded by Fort, Wayne, Lafayette, and Shelby Streets. Then came another long controversy over the question whether half the block was sufficient. The chief promoter of that location was at con- siderable expense in gathering faets from other cities to prove that the half block would be ample for the needs of the city for a lifetime. Wiser counsels finally prevailed and the whole block was purchased in 1885 and 1887 at a cost of $400,000. The whole appropriation was increased to $1,100,000. Additional appropriations were made from time to time and the final cost of the main structure, with land and furnishings, was about $1,550,000. Excavation was begun June 29, 1890. The work of construction was slow. The first floor was occupied by the postoffice in November, 1897, and it was many months after that before the whole building was completed. This portion of the building is 200 by 152 feet in dimensions, four stories in height with basement and loft. The height of the tower is 243 feet. The exterior is of the so-called American style of arthitecture and the interior is Romanesque.
The city had grown so fast during the period of construction that the building was not fully occupied before its capacity was outgrown. Some of the offices . went back to the old building on Griswold Street and agitation was begun for the enlargement of the new. This ultimately resulted in an addition of three stories with the basement and loft on the north half of the lot. This was so skillfully handled architecturally that the completed structure stands as a symmetrical whole. The basement, the ground floor and part of the second floor of the building are occupied by the postal force. The customs and internal revenue offices take up the rest of the second floor. On the third floor are the district court rooms and the offices of the elerk, district attorney, marshal, etc. In the basement and on the fourth floor there is a variety of other governmental offices. The building is uncomfortably crowded and the next move contemplated is another million dollar plant for mail distribution near the Michigan Central depot, leaving the present structure mainly for office uses.
CHAPTER XV
PUBLIC UTILITIES
HOW THE FIRST DETROITER SECURED WATER-BERTHELET'S PUMP-UNDER CITY CONTROL-REMOVAL OF THE WORKS-ENTENSIVE ENLARGEMENTS-FILTRATION AND THE DETROIT FILTER PLANT, BY THEODORE A. LEISEN-DEVELOPMENT OF FILTRATION-CLASSIFICATION OF FILTERS-FILTRATION IN THE U. S .- HYGIENIC RESULTS-DETROIT PLANT-INTRODUCTION OF GAS-EXPERIMENTS IN STREET LIGHTING-BEGINNING OF MUNICIPAL LIGHTING-THE EDISON PLANT- TELEGRAPH AND TELEPHONE SERVICE-FIRST STREET RAILWAY LINES- DEVELOPMENT OF THE SYSTEM-A STATE OF WAR-RECENT INCIDENTS AND BEGINNING OF MUNICIPAL OWNERSHIP SYSTEM-MOTORBUS SERVICE.
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