 
Gazhekwe
Member
Username: Gazhekwe
Post Number: 698
Registered: 08-2007
| | Posted on Monday, October 01, 2007 - 11:10 am: |    |
Martha Griffiths! Later she was Blanchard's Lieut Gov. She was elected to the US House in 1954, and was the first woman to on the Ways and Means Committee. |
Paulmcall
Member
Username: Paulmcall
Post Number: 436
Registered: 05-2004
| | Posted on Monday, October 01, 2007 - 11:12 am: | |
Martha Griffiths. |
Brougham
Member
Username: Brougham
Post Number: 49
Registered: 01-2007
| | Posted on Monday, October 01, 2007 - 11:20 am: | |
Well, there you go ! Anyway she had an office there for a while and my older brother and his friends did some work for her back then. |
Ray1936
Member
Username: Ray1936
Post Number: 2014
Registered: 01-2005
| | Posted on Monday, October 01, 2007 - 11:42 am: | |
Digger O'Dell was a character in the old "Fibber McGee and Molly" radio show. He was an undertaker, and always introduced himself as "Digger O'dell, your friendly undertaker". Copycats used the name for promotional stunts such as car dealers. Digger always had a poem on the show. One that I remember was:
"He wanted to fly,
but he made a blunder
Instead of six feet up,
he's six feet under." |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 138
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Monday, October 01, 2007 - 2:24 pm: | |
I am trying to remember....I think there was a health food store, not far from Mouse House - anyone recall?
Also wondering....any of the respondents to this thread play sports for Cooley, Mackenzie, or Redford? |
Brougham
Member
Username: Brougham
Post Number: 50
Registered: 01-2007
| | Posted on Monday, October 01, 2007 - 3:20 pm: | |
I dont recall a health food store back in the 60's-70's in the neighborhood.
I didn't play High School Sports but my Brother in law played on the Cooley football team 69-71.
He played wide receiver, I think. |
Ray1936
Member
Username: Ray1936
Post Number: 2018
Registered: 01-2005
| | Posted on Monday, October 01, 2007 - 3:42 pm: | |
Nope, I hated gym so much that I took ROTC at Mackenzie instead. Learned a lot more there than had I been a jock. |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 139
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Monday, October 01, 2007 - 3:44 pm: | |
Brougham...That's cool & it's nice to know Cooley had more than just a running game; passing offenses were rare among DPSSAL teams in my day (early to mid 1970s). |
Birwood
Member
Username: Birwood
Post Number: 4
Registered: 10-2007
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 03, 2007 - 1:44 pm: | |
I remember Joe May Cheverolet being just a few doors west of the Firehouse, Engine Co 49 on Grand River at Manor, with Avis Ford being located next door. The 3 way intersection,of Grand River, Meyers and Fullerton, then came the Tower Theater and then Stu Evans mercury. I had an uncle who was the Bodyshop Mgr there. We had a Detroit News paper station on Sorrento in a storefront just north of Grand River and the Free Press station was at the small store across from the bank on the NW corner of Meyers & Grand River |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 156
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 03, 2007 - 2:00 pm: | |
Anyone remember the "Auto Drive Away" car rental store on NW c/o Ward & Grand River....had the weird "two-headed" car in the front window.
Ray....what was the distance between rifleman & target at Mackenzie's indoor range? |
Ray1936
Member
Username: Ray1936
Post Number: 2028
Registered: 01-2005
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 03, 2007 - 4:48 pm: | |
Fifty feet. |
Gazhekwe
Member
Username: Gazhekwe
Post Number: 728
Registered: 08-2007
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 03, 2007 - 5:05 pm: | |
That pushmepullyu car was, I think, a Ford Crown Vic Skyliner, 1955, I think. There were several of those made, I forget the promo right now. I don't think they were really reversible. |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 163
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 03, 2007 - 5:15 pm: | |
Gaz...I would spend a lot of time in the window staring at that car, wondering if & how it operated. |
Reddog289
Member
Username: Reddog289
Post Number: 20
Registered: 08-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 3:23 am: | |
have to ask my uncle about the pushmepullyou car,he talks about joe may chevrolet, the mouse house in livonia was at 7& inkster, there was one in ypsi also, the last one i think was at plymouth & farmington. mrs miller [mouses mom] was working there,nice lady. i was kinda funny when i worked at plymouth & farmington. the shopping center had DSR bus stop signs, then the mouse house moved in, all the while you had the shops that were around in the 50,s&60,s. closeing up. but then again rosedale gardens is almost as old as rosedale park. |
56packman
Member
Username: 56packman
Post Number: 1808
Registered: 12-2005
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 8:15 am: | |
I went with my folks to Joe May Chevrolet in 1963 to buy our brand new '63 Bel Air station wagon. I have vague memories of pacing around the showroom while the deal was being cooked (I was 4 year old). Joe got caught cheating on the floor plan and that was the end of his dealership. |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 166
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 8:34 am: | |
56packman...just wondering what is meant by cheating on the floor plan? |
56packman
Member
Username: 56packman
Post Number: 1809
Registered: 12-2005
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 9:38 am: | |
A floor plan was/is a business arrangement a dealer has with his source of financing, in the case of Joe May it was probably GMAC, occasionally a bank
. The dealer has a revolving line of credit/cash advances based on the number of vehicles they carry on the lot ("bought from stock" cars, not customer-ordered/optioned cars) occasionally a dealer would cheat the floor plan by purchasing and stocking fewer vehicles than the floor plan stipulated, the dealer principal was usually off doing extra-curricular things with the difference. Finance companies would pay private investigators to drive by dealerships at night and walk around the lot with one of those click-counters and report the lot count to them. |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 167
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 9:46 am: | |
56packman....wow, that is interesting; I can see such a scheme as sub-plot for a movie based on the glory years of automobile industry. |
56packman
Member
Username: 56packman
Post Number: 1810
Registered: 12-2005
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 9:54 am: | |
It's a sub-plot in the movie "Fargo" there are scenes with Jerry Lundegaard (William H. Macy) taking/dodging calls from the bank over vin numbers, doctoring up faxes so that they appeared to be garbled in transmission. in typical Cohen brothers fashion, you never really know what sort of money trouble he is in. |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 168
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 10:07 am: | |
56packman....Here' a weird story for you and the readers: My family was driving home to Dayton from Illinois last Thanksgiving weekend; I'm driving....the wife and kids are watching "Fargo" on a laptop computer.
Just after crossing over from Indiana to Ohio, we were pulled over by a State Trooper - pretty creepy, with respect to a similar situation in the movie.
Now....to avoid a total threadjack:
There used to be a little agency near c/o Schaefer & Grand River...it was called A.E.C; always reminded me of Atomic Energy Commission - no connection whatsoever. |
Ray1936
Member
Username: Ray1936
Post Number: 2033
Registered: 01-2005
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 12:29 pm: | |
I'm surprised none of you remember Skiffington Kaiser-Frazer at Grand River just west of Meyers/Fullerton. Or maybe I'm just too old a fart! My grandfather bought a '50 Kaiser, and I learned to drive with that thing. It was first cousin to a Sherman tank. Manual transmission, of course. I don't think K-F ever made an automatic. |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 172
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 12:36 pm: | |
Ray....Did Kaiser Motors have anything to do with Kaiser Aluminum, or Kaiser Broadcasting (original owners of WKBD-TV50)? |
Gazhekwe
Member
Username: Gazhekwe
Post Number: 743
Registered: 08-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 1:14 pm: | |
We had a Kaiser when I was about four. I think it was late 40s, maybe 1950. What a car! It had lots of stuff on the dash. My mother used to say they never did figure out what all the buttons were for. |
56packman
Member
Username: 56packman
Post Number: 1814
Registered: 12-2005
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 1:23 pm: | |
Yes, they were all enterprises of super industrialist Henry J. Kaiser (look him up on Google). Kaiser permante, a hospital chain in the west is a facet of Kaiser that is still going.
The Kaiser-Frazier car company was organized out of the remains of the Graham Brothers Company (which was in turn organized out of the Paige-Detroit company) as an independent auto manufacturing concern. They bought the Ford bomber plant at Willow run and converted it into their plant. Kaiser bought Willys Overland in Toledo (1954), and produced Jeeps from '53 until '70, when Kaiser-jeep was sold to AMC.
K-F cars were solid cars, their styling became outdated before they could afford to tool a new body and their cars were powered by a Continental flat-head six cylinder engine (Kaiser owned Continental during this era) which by the early 50's was yesterday's engine, the Cadillac big bore/short stroke overhead valve V-8 started the modern engine era (the '49 Cadillac engine is the granddaddy of all post-war engines), the Olds rocket and Chrysler Hemi followed and anything else was antiquated. K-F threw the towel in 1955. There is an outstanding book titled "the last onslaught on Detroit" by noted automotive historian Richard M. Langworth--a good read for anyone interested in automotive history. |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 173
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 1:34 pm: | |
Thanks 56packman....I see too that Kaiser was big into ship building for the US Military during WWII - amazing! |
Gazhekwe
Member
Username: Gazhekwe
Post Number: 745
Registered: 08-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 1:56 pm: | |
Kaiser also started the Kaiser Health Plan. He persuaded the US to build clinics in his plants to keep the war workers well, then bought them up after the war. |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 174
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 2:06 pm: | |
Anyone recall whether or not there was a roundhouse/turntable at the Schaefer & Fullerton Railroad Yard? Seems like there was, but after the early 70s, I don't recall seeing it anymore.
Perhaps I am senile and/or delirious? |
Ray1936
Member
Username: Ray1936
Post Number: 2035
Registered: 01-2005
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 2:07 pm: | |
Found it. Me and my kid brother and my grandfather's brand new 1950 Kaiser.
Jeez, I was skinny back then....... 
|
Ray1936
Member
Username: Ray1936
Post Number: 2036
Registered: 01-2005
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 2:08 pm: | |
There was a roundhouse with a turntable back then, Chuck. No idea when it disappeared, tho. |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 176
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 2:40 pm: | |
Ray.....that is one sweet automobile; I wonder how well it did on a gallon of gasoline.
Was your little brother a Mackite too? |
Ptpelee
Member
Username: Ptpelee
Post Number: 26
Registered: 09-2005
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 4:10 pm: | |
What was the purpose of that gas tank(tower?) on Schaefer? I remember it, but I was pretty young (early '70's). When did it disappear? |
Ray1936
Member
Username: Ray1936
Post Number: 2037
Registered: 01-2005
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 5:46 pm: | |
Yup, Chuck, brother Dave went to Mackenzie. Day he graduated he joined the Air Force and went to Stead AFB near Reno. Fell in love with Nevada and today lives in Tonopah, NV, and works at the Tonopah test range.
Ptpelee, there's a whole thread on the gas tanks at https://www.atdetroit.net/forum/mes sages/5/113861.html?1191250117 |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 179
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 7:13 pm: | |
Ray & Brougham...just wondering if you were familiar with the Behr-Manning Abrasives Company; they were located on Schaefer, not too far south of Plymouth.
Funny thing about this site: all sorts of sights and sounds jump back into my brain.
Just like the little electrolysis shop on Schaefer, just north of Fullerton.
Crazy stuff like that.
(Message edited by chuckjav on October 04, 2007) |
Gazhekwe
Member
Username: Gazhekwe
Post Number: 753
Registered: 08-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 7:19 pm: | |
How about that old couple who had rooms to let in the farmhouse on Schaefer just north of Fullerton, or that log cabin (turns out it's cement logs)? |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 180
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 7:30 pm: | |
Yes Gaz - excellent recollection.....wasn't that farmhouse next to the electrolysis shop; set further back from the road? I seem to remember another farmhouse (with barn) on Schaefer, a bit further north from the 14th Precinct House. Where abouts was the cement log house? |
Gazhekwe
Member
Username: Gazhekwe
Post Number: 754
Registered: 08-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 7:34 pm: | |
Yes, I think it was next to the shop, definitely set back a bit. The log house is somewhere north of Fullerton. It's still there, we saw it a couple of months ago. East side of the street. |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 181
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 7:46 pm: | |
Gaz....another landmark - at Schaefer & Fullerton, was the lumberyard/hardware store; I became a regular at that place.
We lived across the street from a very small ball field and without fail...my brother - who was a pull hitter, would shatter at least one of our windows - every season - from '69 through '73.
For some reason, the repair work was my responsibility....kind of odd - considering he was my older brother.
Off to the hardware store I would go. |
Ray1936
Member
Username: Ray1936
Post Number: 2039
Registered: 01-2005
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 7:56 pm: | |
Can't remember that hardware store, but around Schaefer and Fullerton wasn't there a plant named "Nelson Chemicals"? Seems I recall a sign of a glass beaker with a fact on it pouring stuff out of itself.
Chuck...can't comment on what gas mileage the Kaiser had. Just don't recall. |
Birwood
Member
Username: Birwood
Post Number: 10
Registered: 10-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 9:24 pm: | |
Nelson Chemical corner of Nelson & Schaefer burned in a spectacilar 5 Alarm fire in the early 70's.
One of my best bubs and classmate from MHS lived on Allenby, his Dad was a Police Lt. who worked at DPD Westside Radio which was the radio transmitter for the westside and was in a fenced lot on Shirley.
I was also seeing a sharp spinner of a little redhead, "MHS 69" who lived on Capitol just west of Schaefer at that time also |
Ray1936
Member
Username: Ray1936
Post Number: 2041
Registered: 01-2005
| | Posted on Thursday, October 04, 2007 - 10:13 pm: | |
Hard to forget the precise address of that west side transmitter, Birwood. KQA-371 was at 9999 Iris. |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 182
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Friday, October 05, 2007 - 6:34 am: | |
Birwood and Ray....Oh yes, I remember Nelson Chemical; older brother and I also had a few friends on Allenby (classmates at George Ford) back in '70-'71. There was a narrow ballfield to the west, near tracks - we played lots of football there. |
56packman
Member
Username: 56packman
Post Number: 1816
Registered: 12-2005
| | Posted on Friday, October 05, 2007 - 6:45 am: | |
Did anyone ever do business at Grand-Schaefer auto parts? I did a lot of work with them in the late 70s. They ran a very good engine machine shop back in the 60s and 70s. Jessie was the machinist, and a damn good one at that!
The building they were in had been a movie theater in the 20s and 30s. I got chummy with the owner and he showed me the room that had been the projection booth, the projectors were long gone but the equipment for dish nights was still in that room, the giant rotating cage with the tickets still inside.
(Message edited by 56packman on October 06, 2007) |
Gazhekwe
Member
Username: Gazhekwe
Post Number: 758
Registered: 08-2007
| | Posted on Friday, October 05, 2007 - 7:10 am: | |
Grand-Schaefer was regular hangout for us in our beater days. We continued to shop with them after they moved to Berkley. I never knew the building was a movie theater! |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 183
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Friday, October 05, 2007 - 8:11 am: | |
56packman & Gaz....the auto parts store sounds familiar, but I am not able to visualize its location - can you help me? |
Gazhekwe
Member
Username: Gazhekwe
Post Number: 759
Registered: 08-2007
| | Posted on Friday, October 05, 2007 - 8:22 am: | |
West of Mistele's. I think there was Misteles, a parking lot, a bar, a driveway to the back then Grand-Schaefer. |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 186
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Friday, October 05, 2007 - 8:30 am: | |
Got it....thanks Gaz.
By the way - I told my family about the hot dog shaped Marcus burgers....they don't believe me; I will show them - teach by example. I don't know if they'll be as tasty - but it's the thought that counts.
Since it is Friday, I just gotz to shout:
Groovy, Groovy, Groovy...Tough, Tough, Tough...The Stags of Mackenzie Don't Take No Stuff! |
Ray1936
Member
Username: Ray1936
Post Number: 2043
Registered: 01-2005
| | Posted on Friday, October 05, 2007 - 4:11 pm: | |
Grand Schaefer auto parts used to be the Carelton Theatre. It was operational until maybe the early 1950s. Might be spelled the Carlton, not sure. Took in a few movies there. Think I saw Grapes of Wrath there as a re-run. |
Chuckjav
Member
Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 199
Registered: 09-2007
| | Posted on Friday, October 05, 2007 - 4:20 pm: | |
Ray...I'd have never guessed the building was once a theatre.
I gots-to believe that the Tower and Great Lakes had the lion's share of ticket sales in the immediate area. |
Ray1936
Member
Username: Ray1936
Post Number: 2046
Registered: 01-2005
| | Posted on Friday, October 05, 2007 - 6:40 pm: | |
Yeah, along with the Beverly across from Sears-Roebuck. Since TV didn't come along until 1948, the war years and shortly thereafter saw the movies as the numero uno form of entertainment. Radio was a close #2, with all the good radio shows that were on then. But going to the movies was a special weekly event back then. |
Birwood
Member
Username: Birwood
Post Number: 11
Registered: 10-2007
| | Posted on Friday, October 05, 2007 - 7:52 pm: | |
Ray...Thanks, I don't know why I said Shirley, but your right it was on Iris, I stand corrected...CRS here I guess.
KQA-371 what a blast from the past, how about the sites for KQA-414 and KQA-205 |
Birwood
Member
Username: Birwood
Post Number: 13
Registered: 10-2007
| | Posted on Friday, October 05, 2007 - 8:20 pm: | |
Did anyone ever enter the model building contests at Jack Davies Hobby Center on Grand River next to the Great Lakes theater. I built a 39 Ford AMT kit....thought for sure I was gonna win. Boy was I wrong....alot more talented people than me out there |
Ray1936
Member
Username: Ray1936
Post Number: 2048
Registered: 01-2005
| | Posted on Friday, October 05, 2007 - 10:22 pm: | |
KQA-414 (east side DPD radio) was on Belle Isle, just to the right of the bridge as you entered the island. DFD transmitter was at Warren and Lawton, although the dispatcher was in DFD headquarters on Lafayette.
Never got much into building models; Lionel trains were my passion way back when. |
56packman
Member
Username: 56packman
Post Number: 1822
Registered: 12-2005
| | Posted on Saturday, October 06, 2007 - 3:11 am: | |
Ray1936--the Carleton was on Fenkell (13135 Fenkell) and was later known as the Surf theater (1955-1964) and the Variety (1970-1973), it seated 1000.
The theater at Grand River/Schaefer under discussion was the Loyal (1926-1939,13803 Grand River) and was renamed the Alvin in 1940, then was converted into a store after that.
Once again, thanks to Andrew Craig Morrison and his 1974 booklet "Opera house,Nickel show and Palace" the best source for information on old Detroit movie houses.
(Message edited by 56packman on October 06, 2007) |
Ray1936
Member
Username: Ray1936
Post Number: 2051
Registered: 01-2005
| | Posted on Saturday, October 06, 2007 - 3:42 pm: | |
Ah, the correction was needed, packman. Yeah, that was it, the Alvin, soon to be Grand Schaefer Auto Parts. |
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