Fire at Historic Fort St. Stagecoach house!

**Danny** · April-11-12, 01:29 PM

GHETTO ALERT!!!There was a fire at the historic Fort St. Stagecoach house at Southwest Detroit near Woodmere St. What a horrible loss for the 130 year old building! Who would do such a thing burning down that sturcture? The Owners wanted to restore the building. This is total loss.

**Detroitgayhistoryguy** · April-11-12, 01:52 PM

Originally Posted by Danny

GHETTO ALERT!!!There was a fire at the historic Fort St. Stagecoach house at Southwest Detroit near Woodmere St. What a horrible loss for the 130 year old building! Who would do such a thing burning down that sturcture? The Owners wanted to restore the building. This is total loss.

Is this the building you are referring to? I saw this building last week when I went to Woodmere cemetery and stopped to take a picture because I thought it looked really old and cool.

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**Danny** · April-11-12, 02:00 PM

Yes! that's the one.

**SWMAP** · April-11-12, 02:01 PM

Driving around SW Detroit I am sickened and horrified. Detroit is being sacked - as Rome was. It is being stripped and burned and defiled with filth and threats. This from Wikipedia on the Sack of Rome:

On August 24, 410, slaves opened Rome's Salarian Gate and the Visigoths poured in and looted for three days. Many of the city's great buildings were ransacked, including the mausoleums of Augustus and Hadrian, in which many Roman Emperors of the past were buried; the ashes of the urns in both tombs were scattered. This was the first time the city had been sacked in 800 years, and its citizens were devastated. Many Romans were taken captive, including the Emperor's sister, Galla Placidia, who subsequently married Ataulf. Tens of thousands of Romans subsequently fled the economically ruined city into the countryside,^"

**Detroitgayhistoryguy** · April-11-12, 02:07 PM

Damn, that really looked like a cool building. Here is the building across the street from it.

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**Danny** · April-11-12, 02:08 PM

It this the retaliation from Black Panther Leader Malik Shabazz saying "WE WILL BURN DETROIT DOWN! IF THE STATE TAKES OVER!" Several arson fires were being reported in Highland Park and fewer Detroit ghettoohoods. More buring of Detroit homes and building continue? I will turn on the news and find out.

**EastsideAl** · April-11-12, 03:40 PM

One of the very few remnants of the old Springwells Township village of Woodmere. Truly a sad loss.

**poobert** · April-11-12, 03:54 PM

Originally Posted by SWMAP

Driving around SW Detroit I am sickened and horrified. Detroit is being sacked - as Rome was. It is being stripped and burned and defiled with filth and threats. This from Wikipedia on the Sack of Rome:

On August 24, 410, slaves opened Rome's Salarian Gate and the Visigoths poured in and looted for three days. Many of the city's great buildings were ransacked, including the mausoleums of Augustus and Hadrian, in which many Roman Emperors of the past were buried; the ashes of the urns in both tombs were scattered. This was the first time the city had been sacked in 800 years, and its citizens were devastated. Many Romans were taken captive, including the Emperor's sister, Galla Placidia, who subsequently married Ataulf. Tens of thousands of Romans subsequently fled the economically ruined city into the countryside,^"

Southwest Detroit...Northwest Detroit...Northeast Detroit...Southeast Detroit...all the same story, to varying degrees. There isn't a neighborhood anymore that isn't scarred by blight. I take East Warren to work, the spance of the eastside, and literally every week there is a new burned out structure. Even if anyone can save Detroit, frankly there is little left to be saved, and at this rate in a few years there will be almost nothing.

**hhockey** · April-11-12, 06:38 PM

the building across the street from it use to be Smoke Brothers Florist, which had been in business many many years.

**Crystal** · April-11-12, 06:53 PM

Report about the Proposed Distel Building Historic District:

http://www.ci.detroit.mi.us/LinkClic...=3096&mid=4357

**gazhekwe** · April-11-12, 06:57 PM

Wow,that is interesting, Crystal!

**Detroitgayhistoryguy** · April-11-12, 09:02 PM

I went down and took a ton of photos and video. Unfortunately it is a total loss. So sad, and probably the last structure left in Detroit relating to stagecoaches.

You can see my photos and video here:

http://www.motorgay.net/2012/04/hist...t-detroit.html

**Richard** · April-11-12, 09:20 PM

Originally Posted by Crystal

Report about the Proposed Distel Building Historic District:

http://www.ci.detroit.mi.us/LinkClic...=3096&mid=4357

I find it interesting how the city designates a singular building as a historic district verses the entire neighborhood which would help the entire,instead of having a historic building in the midst of chaos .

Which makes it easy prey in the future.

SteveJ · April-11-12, 09:55 PM

I'm sure the building was burned for insurance money.

**Crystal** · April-11-12, 10:01 PM

Aw, darn it. I'm so sorry this building burned.

**RickBeall** · April-11-12, 11:09 PM

Great reading, thank you everybody, thank you Crystal. My wifes Mom and Dad are buried in Woodemere. My wife can't believe they used to build ships in the last that is now Woodemere. Maybe Baby creek extended up that far?

**Meddle** · April-12-12, 01:58 AM

Originally Posted by SteveJ

I'm sure the building was burned for insurance money.

And your proof is?

**Al Publican** · April-12-12, 03:03 AM

Nihilism seems to be the correct fit in describing such wrong doing. I'm surprised that nihilism isn't used in the media and in social science circles to label anti-social behavior.

I chronicled Detroit's status on a daily basis for 17 years, but it was not for the media or academe.

**Zozo** · April-12-12, 12:08 PM

I grew up in that neighborhood. Between'97-'99, I probably was in the building twenty times. It was a little hang out for me and my friends. We didn't break in and vandelize anything- the rear of the building was never secure. We would just go in there and talk and play cards. Everything within the building was wooden, and it smelled like smokey, wet wood throughout, always. The floors were very soft, and you had to be very careful about where you stepped. There was nothing very remarkable about the building. I believe there was one sign within the building that read, "Stage Coach Shop". Lots of piles of dirt everywhere.

If you want to see real destruction, walk down Distel one block towards Higgins Elementary. You will not believe your eyes. This building has been entirely gutted and sprayed with graffiti to its core. My personal theory is that the industrial blight from Del Ray is now finally starting to creep across Fort St. into the so called Springwells Village area. I predict similar abandonment and destruction to occur in the nearby Bayside/Oakwood Heights neighborhood, where Marathon is expanding. Chasing smokestacks... hmmm... maybe not the best policy to grow a city in the 21st century...

Another theory I have about the decline of the Springwells Village neighborhood is that it never really attracted many Hispanic immigrants. The neighborhood is actually mostly poor whites and some blacks, whom are all trying to get out of the neighborhood to downriver as soon as possible, whereas the Hispanics I have observed are more likely to settle down, plant roots, and at least attempt to maintain their property.

**gnome** · April-12-12, 01:28 PM

From the City's Historical Designation PDF:

History:
The Distel Building Historic District is significant as a rare apparently unique survivor of asubstantial building of c.1870 built outside the city and now located within it. Its continued presenceand usage reflected the industrial development and physical expansion of the city of Detroit,particularly of Southwest Detroit. The building is closely associated with the Distel family, whichsettled in Detroit just after 1800 and played a role in the development of Springwells Township, theDistel Subdivision, and Woodmere properties, all incorporated into the City of Detroit in the early1900s.

On April 12, 1827, the area known as Spring Hill officially became Springwells Township by anact of the state legislature. Besides the natural springs located near the present site of Fort Wayne,Springwells Township's earliest development centered around the construction of ships. TheShipyard Tract is a tract of land located on the Rouge River and Baby Creek near West Fort Street.After Detroit's conflagration of 1805, the United States Congress authorized a Land Commission forsurvey of the area. According to the commission's survey, the inlet was called the Ship Yard Tract.During the Revolutionary War, ships were built by occupying British forces on the inlet at thepresent day Woodmere Cemetery [[established 1869). Ships continued to be built and fitted out thereduring the occupation by the British, and then under American rule by the United States Army in theWar of 1812.

Between1849 and1916, portions of Springwells Township were annexed to Detroiton six different occasions. In 1906, Detroit annexed the little villages of Woodmere and Delray.

more info here:
http://www.ci.detroit.mi.us/LinkClic...=3096&mid=4357

**WaCoTS** · April-12-12, 10:47 PM

taht really sucks...that was one of my favorite blgs in SW; i pass it often.

according to the pastor of St Mark's a couple yrs ago when i was there, someone actually cared about the blg.

on a side note, the astute reader will note that Springwells Twp turned 185yrs old today.