Detroit Hardware closing.

If anyone wants to see a real hardware store before they're all gone,... mno better example than Detroit Hardware, on the S.WE. corner of Woodward And Milwaukee.

They're closing up mid June.

They've been there since 1924. Plank wood floors. A mechanical machine for writing 2-part receipts.

I have a business that's had an account there for at least the last 60 years. Perhaps 90 or better. Gonna miss the place.

The people working there were simply in the mood to retire, or at least take a vacation,.. and some individual [[not Gilbert) came and offered to buy the whole building.

That's extremely sad news. The place was indeed a real throwback to a time of actual service and personal relationships with the people you were buying from. They were also so nice and accommodating to my elderly father when he got past the point where he could really handle little household jobs.

It's a shame to see them go now after they held on for all those years, through the decline of that New Center strip on Woodward and the city around it And with that, the disappearance of so many of their customers. Now that there's finally so much positive activity in the area, and the very real possibility of new and increasing traffic, such a useful business fades away.

However, I guess the silver lining, at least for the owners, is that it sounds like the city's rising tide has made their business, and more particularly the building it's in, valuable enough that they can now sell it and retire.

Sorry to hear. I think back often when I was in high school and WSU in the mid fifties; worked at Fromm's Hardware, 8670 Grand River. Fromm's had a main store in Highland Park and seven outliers. I learned more of practical value in that job than anything I learned in school. Also had a store manager that didn't mind one bit if I asked about a feature on a tool I didn't understand.

Also it was the days of customer service. A customer didn't have to search the store high and low for an item; we'd get it for him with a smile.

[[Comment: Went on the web site for Lowe's yesterday searching for an item. I not only found it, but the site told me exactly what aisle and bin number to find it in. Good for Lowe's!)