Lakewood East/Angel Park Closed

**milt721** · June-02-14, 08:57 AM

Cruised by there the other week and found the gates locked and concrete blocks plopped down in front of the gates. Anyone know when that happened and if there are any plans to reopen? It's a prime riverside location.

**EASTSIDE CAT 67-83** · June-02-14, 10:00 AM

I was in Detroit visiting family during the memorial day long weekend and took a drive thru both parks on Friday the 22nd of May so it had to be after that. It amazes me how nature has reclaimed Angel Park, I spent many a summer days tossing a frisbee in that parking lot.

**milt721** · June-02-14, 11:51 AM

Originally Posted by EASTSIDE CAT 67-83

I was in Detroit visiting family during the memorial day long weekend and took a drive thru both parks on Friday the 22nd of May so it had to be after that. It amazes me how nature has reclaimed Angel Park, I spent many a summer days tossing a frisbee in that parking lot.

Wow, I must have been there just a day or two after your visit. Good thing you drove through when you did.

**EASTSIDE CAT 67-83** · June-02-14, 12:35 PM

Surprisingly it seems like Lakewood park gets more usage these days than Angel does, it was the other way around back in the day.

**Jerry Van** · June-04-14, 03:10 PM

O.K. Somebody clue me in. When I was a kid, [[early 70's), mom used to take me and the neighbor kids to Lakewood Park, [[foot of Altar road, then over the bridge and into the park).

Later, I heard it referred to as Angel Park. I was told it was a nickname, due to the Hell's Angels taking it over, thus ending our visits. Today everyone calls it Angel Park and almost nobody knows the name Lakewood park, [[except here I guess).

So, are these two different parks? Two names for the same park? My imagination? Or, was it all just a dream?

**cla1945** · June-04-14, 06:58 PM

Originally Posted by Jerry Van

O.K. Somebody clue me in. When I was a kid, [[early 70's), mom used to take me and the neighbor kids to Lakewood Park, [[foot of Altar road, then over the bridge and into the park).

Later, I heard it referred to as Angel Park. I was told it was a nickname, due to the Hell's Angels taking it over, thus ending our visits. Today everyone calls it Angel Park and almost nobody knows the name Lakewood park, [[except here I guess).

So, are these two different parks? Two names for the same park? My imagination? Or, was it all just a dream?

Lakewood park was at the foot of Lakewood Street and Angel Park was the foot of Alter. We never called it anything but the foot of Lakewood and the foot of Alter back in the 50s and 60s.

**EASTSIDE CAT 67-83** · June-05-14, 07:45 AM

So did anyone ever figure out why it is/was closed?

**Jerry Van** · June-05-14, 11:16 AM

Originally Posted by cla1945

Lakewood park was at the foot of Lakewood Street and Angel Park was the foot of Alter. We never called it anything but the foot of Lakewood and the foot of Alter back in the 50s and 60s.

Well, interesting... In that area, Google maps shows Mariner's Park, Riverside-Lakewood Park & Alfred Brush Ford Park, but no Angel Park. In fact a Google Map search for "Angel Park" comes up with nothing. A Yahoo search is also no help.

**EASTSIDE CAT 67-83** · June-05-14, 12:49 PM

Thats because its the unofficial local nickname for the park, I grew up in the neighborhood and we only used two names, Alter or Angel Park. I believe the use of "Angel" started in the early 70s.

**Jerry Van** · June-05-14, 02:45 PM

"I believe the use of "Angel" started in the early 70s. "

YES! Agreed. As I stated, it was when the Hell's Angel's began to use it as a hangout. As a kid, I remember the bikers showing up and mom thinking that junior and her didn't belong there anymore.

**EastsideAl** · June-05-14, 04:07 PM

Originally Posted by Jerry Van

Well, interesting... In that area, Google maps shows Mariner's Park, Riverside-Lakewood Park & Alfred Brush Ford Park, but no Angel Park. In fact a Google Map search for "Angel Park" comes up with nothing. A Yahoo search is also no help.

Mariner's Park is where the former Marine Hospital was until the late '60s. Alfred Brush Ford Park is the official name for what everyone in the local neighborhood has always called "Lakewood Park." "Riverside-Lakewood Park" is a misnomer for what was Angell [[or "Angel") Park and is now, strangely, apparently called Lakewood East by the city. Oh, I do remember that area though!

When I was a kid Lakewood Park was where my cousins and I played and where my grandfather walked his dog. The area that became Angell Park was reachable by a little bridge over a canal from the island with the Marine Hospital and the trailer park on it and was a dirt road through weedy land that led to a couple of old boatyards. That area became a hangout for local youth and an area of unsupervised drinking, smoking [[of various things), etc.

In the late '60s and early '70s the city put in a new bridge over the canal, a new bus turnaround [[to replace the one that used to be in front of the Marine Hospital), and a parking lot. They also cut down the weeds, tore down some old structures, and planted grass. They named the place "Angell Park" after James B. Angell, who had been President of U of M during its formative years, a vital U.S. diplomat, and, most importantly for this purpose, had been the first to conceive of and push for the building of what became the St. Lawrence Seaway, bringing ocean-going ships and commerce to the Great Lakes.

This was all designed to make it a 'family park,' but it backfired as the parking lot made it even more accessible to the people my grandfather always called "those goddamn hippies." I remember hanging out there with my cousins, getting stoned for the first time, listening to music from all the cars, dancing in the parking lot, swimming in the canals, etc. Along with Balduck Park, it was one of the big party spots on the east side, a place where you could buy some stuff and get high, and a lot of stoners, hippies, bikers [[definitely including the Hell's Angels), Grosse Pointe kids, and just plain partying youth hung out there. Making the name "Angel Park" seem very appropriate to everybody in the area.

The cops kept trying to "clean it up", and even put gates on the parking area to close it at night. Eventually, the city pretty much stopped maintaining it, and as I understand it officially "decommissioned" it as Angell Park. All of which meant that it turned into a dumping ground. But people still came to hang out and party there even though the place was literally falling apart.

One of the reasons that most of that area remained undeveloped for so long it that it was being held for possible defense purposes. The Marine Hospital was, of course, under the Department of Defense. The western end of Lakewood Park [[the part accessible at the end of Lenox) was a missile base and radar station [[the radar towers are still standing). Just a little further west, what is now Maheras Park was a military barracks area during WWII, and was later a Nike missile base during the Cold War, as was the eastern end of Belle Isle.

Interestingly, the original plan for the area was to build a scenic riverside drive. Riverside St. [[the street that runs to the park from the bridge at the foot of Alter) was supposed to connect over a couple of bridges to Riverside Dr., which is now just the mysteriously named last block and a half of Drexel.

**kryptonite** · June-06-14, 07:57 AM

Google maps says Alfred Brush Ford park is at the food of Lakewood St. East of that is Riverfront-Lakewood Park. If I remember years ago one of them was Engel Park?? I always thought that was where people got 'Angel Park' from.

**EASTSIDE CAT 67-83** · June-06-14, 08:36 AM

Eastside Al
Thanks for the righteous history lesson, as an aside if you look at the DTE Aerial Photo collection site linked below it has aerial photos starting from 1949 thru 1997. It shows Angel park ringed with boat docks on all sides going all the way up to the riverfront. It looks like they were removed sometime in the mid-late 60s. Pretty interesting stuff, also a great way to view the scope of urban prairie. Thanks again Al.

http://www.clas.wayne.edu/photos/ap_index.htm

**EastsideAl** · June-06-14, 04:24 PM

Originally Posted by EASTSIDE CAT 67-83

Eastside Al
Thanks for the righteous history lesson, as an aside if you look at the DTE Aerial Photo collection site linked below it has aerial photos starting from 1949 thru 1997. It shows Angel park ringed with boat docks on all sides going all the way up to the riverfront. It looks like they were removed sometime in the mid-late 60s. Pretty interesting stuff, also a great way to view the scope of urban prairie. Thanks again Al.

http://www.clas.wayne.edu/photos/ap_index.htm

Thanks Cat. Sorry for prattling on a bit above. I know you came up around there, so a lot is preaching to the choir.

I love those DTE aerials. They just show you so much information. I do vaguely remember those docks around that end of the island. My grandfather kept his boat at my great-uncle's place on Klenk, and later at his buddies place on Scripps, so he would navigate around there on his way out into the river.

There were also at one time apparently a bunch of houses and boathouses scattered around there down by the river. My grandfather had stories from the prohibition days, including some about using the big range light towers that used to stand around the Marine Hospital as guides and signaling points for runs out of Peche Island.

And, of course, there was the beautiful Lighthouse Center [[former Windmill Pointe Yacht Club) where my grandparents would go to play cards with some other old folks.

So, I wonder if the fact that they've blocked it off means that they're actually going to finally do something with that park. Or is it just to try to stop the dumping, while letting the decay continue unabated.

**Jerry Van** · June-10-14, 03:27 PM

Al,

Thanks for setting the history straight. Many happy days spent there watching the freighters go by. I don't think they come any closer than through that stretch.

**EastsideAl** · June-10-14, 04:39 PM

Originally Posted by kryptonite

Google maps says Alfred Brush Ford park is at the food of Lakewood St. East of that is Riverfront-Lakewood Park. If I remember years ago one of them was Engel Park?? I always thought that was where people got 'Angel Park' from.

Engel Park is the park at the foot of Fairview. Now behind a gate and part of a marina complex.

The land was originally cleared to erect quonset huts that served as federal housing for military families and for war workers during WWII. These were then operated by the city as the Croxon Projects into the 1950s to relieve the east side of Detroit's acute post-war housing shortage [[hah!), before they were torn down to create the park. This was one of a number of sch "temporary" quonset hut projects that stood around the city in those years. Some of the huts up around Conner and Warren stood into the 1960s when I was a kid.