Brush Park - 312 Watson Street

[p69rrh51]

A link to the final report for Brush Park.

http://www.detroitmi.gov/LinkClick.a...=3096&mid=4357

[mwilbert]

It appears that this property is up for auction at the Wayne County tax auction in September. If it is the correct property [[sometimes they mess up the addresses) the minimum bid is $12K.

[Django]

This house is also in the new series Low Winter Sun, last episode at 21:24.

Also I helped out showing around a film crew working for National Geographic last year for the Drugs Inc. series on Detroit. They taped a short piece of this house with me sitting on the front porch. You cant tell its me because its such a far away shot but I find it funny this house has gotten so much play lately.

Many years ago a friend and I snuck into this house exploring and found boxes and boxes of NAACP type material, fliers and place cards. Im not sure if it was NAACP material or not, I remember a black pride theme to it.

[wardwood]

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/...35640476095638

DETROIT—Of Detroit's thousands of vacant homes, one dilapidated house at the corner of Watson and Brush streets has become the poster child of the city's decay.

The graffiti-covered brick house with more than 40 blown-out windows, no back door and a squatter living in the front room has appeared on the front page of newspapers and shown up in prime-time TV crime dramas. Now, this abandoned home has a new owner—the city itself.

Last week, at an annual county foreclosure auction, the city paid $12,000 and got the deed to the property, completing the arc of a home that has in many ways traced the history of Detroit. It has served as a mayor's residence, a speakeasy, a racially integrated cancer clinic at a time that was uncommon and an informal Masonic lodge. More recently, it was owned by speculators who bet—wrongly—on a renaissance for Motown.

With Detroit's government in bankruptcy court, 312 Watson St. now is in the hands of city administrators hoping to find deep-pocketed developers interested in engineering a better future for the once-thriving neighborhood of Brush Park.

[motz]

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/...35640476095638

demolish it george jackson it is your destiny!

[EastsideAl]

Of Detroit's thousands of vacant homes, one dilapidated house at the corner of Watson and Brush streets has become the poster child of the city's decay.

That's no lie. The New York Times must have runtheir photo of that house dozens of times. It's been seen with practically every article they've written about the city over the past few years.

[kathy2trips]

Just now getting around to reading the Wall Street Journal article from last month [[yeah, I'm behind in my reading). As it traces the succession of residents at 312 Watson, the article mentions a florist who was elected mayor in 1908.

To elaborate, that florist was Phillip Breitmeyer [[May 13, 1864 – November 8, 1941). He was one of the founders of FTD....yeah, another giant iconic company born in Detroit. This house should be special for that reason alone.

[Bucket]

Renovations at 312 Watson have been taking place throughout the summer.

Here's a shot from today: