Name a 'Not-so-popular' Detroit neighborhood, and why it's intriguing/special to you

Outside of the popular up & coming Detroit areas like Bagley, North End, East English Village, etc. Name a core-neighborhood that draws a special memory for you or even a 'hood you may only ride pass every once in a while that you may find interesting for a specific reason or no reason at all. I'll start first...

Dexter-Linwood, I remember visiting family who lived on Pingree back in the days and it was always a fun time. Block parties on Blaine, and buying Ice Cream from the Ice Cream man on a bicycle by Calvert street who always had soft serve with cones and sprinkles.

Warren & Cadillac, I had a friend who lived on Hurlbut for a few months and I rarely visited, but went to the stores around there once or twice. Once he moved, my job relocated not too far from that area so every once in a while I would stop at the dollar store or corner liquor store for quick snacks and started getting to know the patrons and store owners, that was 6 years ago and now anytime I go around there I still run into someone that's familiar.

I rarely visit either of these areas but quick visits or ride throughs have had an effect on me, Anybody have any stories?

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Originally Posted by Sehv313

Outside of the popular up & coming Detroit areas like

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Delray -- because although its almost a memory now, I remember it as a mostly ghost town in the 80s, 90s with most buildings standing. Was possible then to image it coming back to life with that 'along the Monongahela* valley' feel.

Vernor/Springwells - rare remaining Detroit neighborhood business district with at least a shell of a movie palace hanging about.

*-Likely misspelled Pittsburgh river reference - a city I love in part as its grittier parts remain intact and sometimes loved.

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Originally Posted by Wesley Mouch

Delray -- because although its almost a memory now, I remember it as a mostly ghost town in the 80s, 90s with most buildings standing. Was possible then to image it coming back to life with that 'along the Monongahela* valley' feel.

Vernor/Springwells - rare remaining Detroit neighborhood business district with at least a shell of a movie palace hanging about.

*-Likely misspelled Pittsburgh river reference - a city I love in part as its grittier parts remain intact and sometimes loved.

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Don't think I'd call the old Rio a "movie palace". :)

W Outer Drive for the boulevard + housing stock

GR & Lahser, Old Redford.

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Originally Posted by Wesley Mouch

Delray -- because although its almost a memory now, I remember it as a mostly ghost town in the 80s, 90s with most buildings standing. Was possible then to image it coming back to life with that 'along the Monongahela* valley' feel.

Vernor/Springwells - rare remaining Detroit neighborhood business district with at least a shell of a movie palace hanging about.

*-Likely misspelled Pittsburgh river reference - a city I love in part as its grittier parts remain intact and sometimes loved.

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By the time I grew up Delray was looking a lot like Brightmoor and City Airport area, so me riding through there I sometimes wonder what life was like down there in the 40's/50's. Vernor/Springwells is still thriving though, reminds me of a smaller Jos Campau street.

Pinehurst & West Chicago, for no reason other than I spent the first 16 years of my life in that little house on Pinehurst. Every once in a while I'll drive through the neighborhood, get out of my car, walk around a bit and try to resurrect all those people I knew from the '50s and '60s. One day I'm gonna muster up the courage to ask whoever the current homeowner is if I can come in and have a look around the old place. Been 51 years since I was last inside.

7 Mile and Kelly.It's where I grew up and I used to know every square inch of that area, on foot and by bicycle. I drive through now and again and one time when I was with friends, one of them DID stop and ask to go through his house. The homeowner was extremely nice and invited him in to see where he had grown up.

Delray: Having seen that area many times in the 50s and 60s [[it was even dwindling then) filled with homes, people and a steady stream of daily traffic, only leaves me to wonder what it looked like in the 30s and 40s.

One only needs to recall what W. Fort St was like [[pre-I-75) from Lawndale all the way to Trumbull and the then-thriving homes and business', as compared to the blight that exists today, and what is gone.
Impossible to forecast then that such a dramatic change would have been possible.
It's the same for any Detroit community.

Nearly all these areas in the 50s were safe for un-escorted women and even young children alone to walk the streets shopping.

Not strictly true; there was always danger even in the "copper canyon" areas. My sister was kidnapped and raped walking home from Denby in the early 60's. There was the case of the 2nd grader from Assumption Grotto who was murdered walking home from Catechism for her 1st Communion in the 50's. There were other high profile murders, rapes and whatnot even back then. What there wasn't was the gun violence we see now. My dad was DPD back in those days and wife beating, alcoholic issues, child abuse, incest, were all things I heard about from him while I was growing up.

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Originally Posted by wilderness

Nearly all these areas in the 50s were safe for un-escorted women and even young children alone to walk the streets shopping.

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Grandmont. I still consider it in the shadows from Rosedale Park. 6 blocks, really, east of the Southfield from Grand River to Schoolcraft. Pretty much knew every square inch, was a paper boy from 79-85 on Rutland [[one of the prettiest streets in the city). Edison Elementary on Grand River had kids from both sides of the freeway and Grand River, many of the folks I still remain in contact with refer to it as "Happy Land." Both school and the neighborhood integrated in the early 70s, many folks still remain in the neighborhood.

Rougher around the edges closer to Schoolcraft in the 70s, the neighborhood has since stabilized for the most part, except for the Southfield Service Drive. But back then it had its share of heroin dens and helicopters buzzing our house seemingly nightly. Add the Young Boys factor [[Butch Jones we later found out kept all the loot at a "sweet crib on Archdale", source "A History of Organized Crime in Detroit", a house I walked by at least twice a day) and the recruitment of paper boys who would roll till an uncle or father found out, and the Chambers crack den across the street from us, the neighborhood remained consistent. The Grandmont / Rosedale development Corp has become a model Neighborhood Stabilization Model for the rest of the city and did an admirable job of holding that entire Grand River / Fenkell / Southfield together, especially thru the Great Recession.

I still drive thru it frequently, have met the current owners of the house I grew up in on Archdale, and see the occasional old neighbor. Many of us who grew up there in the 70s and 80s still remain in contact.

Fort Street from downtown all the way out to Outer Drive and the neighborhoods on either side. Exactly eight straight miles of the best and the worst in a largely industrial setting, which becomes a pleasant commercial/connecting residential mix once you're south of Schaefer, a mix that continues even past Outer Drive where Fort becomes pretty much the Woodward of Downriver.

I find the part of Detroit west of Telegraph interesting, a bulge of blocks that end at the interestingly-named Five Points, that bears the name of "The Eye". Telegraph with its width and high traffic flow made it a somewhat of an island. The presence of Grand Lawn Cemetery across Telegraph gives if further isolation. Five Points was sort of a mini Eight Mile with Redford Township across the street from an ethnically mixed neighborhood on the other side. That situation has quietly moved on.

Here's a useful map for this discussion. Click/Tap image for full size view.
Attachment 41006

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Originally Posted by wilderness

Nearly all these areas in the 50s were safe for un-escorted women and even young children alone to walk the streets shopping.

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I knew a guy who had since passed away, who grew up in Brightmore after the war. He said it was a rough neighborhood even back then.

Here are some I'd like to learn more about:

1) Conant Gardens. As I understand it was one of the first suburban-style neighborhoods where a rising black middle class built or bought homes. There are some interesting examples of mid-century modern architecture there.

2) McDougall-Hunt. After a stint round Hastings, it's where my immigrant family first lived in Detroit. I understand there was racial division and problems of the mob from the start. I wish the ones I knew who experienced it shared more, or I was more persistent asking, but they didn't want to-- they were glad they moved on, it was a time they tried to forget.

Both of which lead me into my next curiosity:

The ground-level mechanics of integration and white flight in Detroit. From anyone who has something to share. Experiences in real estate, the incentives and their consequences, the tactics and their results. Why you left or stayed. How other groups fit in. First-person accounts from different perspectives to reveal a more comprehensive picture.

3) Highland Park. Its rise and fall. I know the car companies had a lot to do with it but there was much more to the story than that.

Another topic that related to all neighborhoods somehow: public and private corruption. Especially from the time of the invention of the automobile, through the boom that followed, until the 70's. The Crimetown Podcast did some great work on this beginning in 1971, 19 episodes, but it long preceded then.

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Originally Posted by jcole

7 Mile and Kelly.It's where I grew up and I used to know every square inch of that area, on foot and by bicycle. I drive through now and again and one time when I was with friends, one of them DID stop and ask to go through his house. The homeowner was extremely nice and invited him in to see where he had grown up.

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I wonder if we ever crossed paths? I used to work at the Morang & Kelly Chatham #8 supermarket, first as a bagger, then as a cashier for 5 years... and had several friends on Riad St.

Living in SCS now for many years, it's nice that a DeRonne Hardware has opened nearby... remembering the one on Morang so long ago.

Seems to fairly quickly becoming the opposite of "no-so-popular," but the North End will always be my 'special' neighborhood. It's the first place my paternal side was able and allowed to buy a nice home in a solid neighborhood. It suffered major decline like a lot of the rest of the city, but in the last decade or so seems to be on the way back up with people moving in from all around the metro and not a insignificant amount of new infill. Took my grandmother back a few years ago; she was tickled to see all of the cyclists on John R and the white folks moving in closer to Woodward. One of her old neighbors she hadn't heard or seen in decades was still living on their old block. The nice, old trees still line and shade their street. It always feels like home.

I was more on the NW corner of 7 and Kelly while you were on the SE side, but I knew a lot of people who frequented "your" Chatham and all the stores along Morang while MY family was at the one on Kelly and Woodcrest, Chatham #1. Do you remember a manager named Shaheen? I think he ran #8. Also, I had friends from St Jude who lived on Riad also.

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Originally Posted by Gistok

I wonder if we ever crossed paths? I used to work at the Morang & Kelly Chatham #8 supermarket, first as a bagger, then as a cashier for 5 years... and had several friends on Riad St.

Living in SCS now for many years, it's nice that a DeRonne Hardware has opened nearby... remembering the one on Morang so long ago.

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Kercheval and McClellan. Was young over there, but from what my mom told me, it was a quiet, predominately Jewish neighborhood becoming integrated around the mid '60s.There were little parks to play in the size of an empty lot between normal size houses. A group of nurses and dieticians ran Mom and Tots school and it was subject of a book by Nancy Milio because the community kept it from burning during riots. As an adult I moved back and made friends in the early '80s. The houses were big as mansions. Plenty of make-do wooden stores along Kercheval, old bbq and bar joints, etc. It wasnt overcrowded, why did East Side burn it was middle class- then.

Another neighborhood is North Corktown or Core City from 12th to Blvd. It was mixed, nonviolent and old and charming. People were nice and kept to themselves. Those days even in 70s friends said careful going down to 'skid row' [[Michigan) to go to Ho Lee Inn[[ now Slow's) or LJ's bar to drink. Even got to sneak into Tiger Stadium a few times.

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Originally Posted by jcole

I was more on the NW corner of 7 and Kelly while you were on the SE side, but I knew a lot of people who frequented "your" Chatham and all the stores along Morang while MY family was at the one on Kelly and Woodcrest, Chatham #1. Do you remember a manager named Shaheen? I think he ran #8. Also, I had friends from St Jude who lived on Riad also.

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Wow, you remember Chatham #1... the first and mini-Chatham in Harper Woods [[long ago known as Chatham Village). I went to Chatham #1 as a child with my parents a few times [[I lived near Balduck Park), but mostly we went to the Morang and Kelly Chatham #8, where my father was on friendly terms with the manager [[Mike Sommers). I worked there in the early 1970s, by then #1 was closed. The Chatham #7 on E. 8 Mile & Gratiot was the 2nd busiest Chatham store, after one downriver on Pennsylvania & ?? By the 1980s the 4 Weisberg brothers who owned Chatham stores sold out to some goon who did the same thing that is happening with Kmart/Sears... milked it dry.

The Chathams story...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatha...nd%20selection.

My brother used to work for Wrigley's Supermarket next to Penney's in the 7-Mack shopping center [[today Pointe Plaza). Back in the day on the east side there were A & P, Kroger, Chatham, Wrigley's, Great Scott's and Packer supermarkets... and now we just have Kroger and [[in other locations) Meijer's.

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Originally Posted by Gistok

Wow, you remember Chatham #1... the first and mini-Chatham in Harper Woods [[long ago known as Chatham Village). I went to Chatham #1 as a child with my parents a few times [[I lived near Balduck Park), but mostly we went to the Morang and Kelly Chatham #8, where my father was on friendly terms with the manager [[Mike Sommers). I worked there in the early 1970s, by then #1 was closed. The Chatham #7 on E. 8 Mile & Gratiot was the 2nd busiest Chatham store, after one downriver on Pennsylvania & ?? By the 1980s the 4 Weisberg brothers who owned Chatham stores sold out to some goon who did the same thing that is happening with Kmart/Sears... milked it dry.

The Chathams story...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatha...nd%20selection.

My brother used to work for Wrigley's Supermarket next to Penney's in the 7-Mack shopping center [[today Pointe Plaza). Back in the day on the east side there were A & P, Kroger, Chatham, Wrigley's, Great Scott's and Packer supermarkets... and now we just have Kroger and [[in other locations) Meijer's.

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Yes, that was the one on the corner of our street, or nearly, which was later a wedding hall I think. We also shopped that the one that replaced it further up Kelly. Mr Sheehan may have been at that one and not the one on Morang.
I've read that Chatham story before and got in touch with someone by email to ask them some questions and they invited me to the Chatham picnic back around 2009/2010 but I couldn't make it.
My brother worked at the A and P on 7 and Mack; it's where he learned to be a butcher and met his wife. My god mother was bookkeeper at the one on Gratiot and 6 Mile

The A&P was on 7 Mile West of Gratiot. There was a Big Bear, later Wrigley's, on Gratiot just North of McNichols across from Assumption Grotto. That store became an auto parts store. The name escapes me.

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Originally Posted by softailrider

I knew a guy who had since passed away, who grew up in Brightmore after the war. He said it was a rough neighborhood even back then.

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Thats funny to me I grew up on Brush St. just north of 6 mile. I had a cousin that lived in brightmore and we thought that was the suburbs compared to my neighborhood!

It’s also funny people on here talk about West side and East side but John R divided our neighborhood and also the West and East side of Detroit. So my friends lived on both sides and we had no concept of West and East siders.

We also had 48203 area code and people assumed it was Highland Park but north of 6 mile is Detroit so I guess we were North siders?

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Originally Posted by Wheels

We also had 48203 area code and people assumed it was Highland Park but north of 6 mile is Detroit so I guess we were North siders?

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That area would be Detroit's North Face.