Great glimpse into the past. Photo is just a tad blurry, but thought I'd pass this link along.
http://www.shorpy.com/node/21676?size=_original#caption
Great glimpse into the past. Photo is just a tad blurry, but thought I'd pass this link along.
http://www.shorpy.com/node/21676?size=_original#caption
Who were these people? Their names? Where were they going? What did they do? Where did they live? Do their descendants still live in metro Detroit? What was Detroit to them?
I love these photos because you can really see the detail in just about everything. It's simply amazing.
I wonder the same thing! I could spend hours looking for the elusive "Time Traveler"!Who were these people? Their names? Where were they going? What did they do? Where did they live? Do their descendants still live in metro Detroit? What was Detroit to them?
I love these photos because you can really see the detail in just about everything. It's simply amazing.
I wish I could offer a time machine into this era but I can't. The closest I can approximate is the film Kafka. It runs 94 minutes and has nothing to do with Detroit but matches the atmosphere of the period very closely.Who were these people? Their names? Where were they going? What did they do? Where did they live? Do their descendants still live in metro Detroit? What was Detroit to them?
I love these photos because you can really see the detail in just about everything. It's simply amazing.
Bookmark it if you don't have the time right now. It's well worth watching.
Always wondered what the equivalent of not wearing a hat back then would be today. No pants?
No baseball hats then either, SammyS. From all the period photos I've seen from the 1800s to about the late 1950s, everyone wore a hat outside. I think about the late 1950s the trend toward hatless began. I remember when one day, about 1963, I was assigned to #2 cruiser [[the Big Four) for a couple of days, the three in civvies had fedoras. I didn't have one, so I went and bought a fishing hat to work those two days. The old timers gave me a dirty eye, and I was never assigned to the cruiser again. [[I didn't much care, all they did was park and drink coffee.)
JFK was the death knell for mens' hats. When he regularly went hatless, that pretty much ended the style.No baseball hats then either, SammyS. From all the period photos I've seen from the 1800s to about the late 1950s, everyone wore a hat outside. I think about the late 1950s the trend toward hatless began. I remember when one day, about 1963, I was assigned to #2 cruiser [[the Big Four) for a couple of days, the three in civvies had fedoras. I didn't have one, so I went and bought a fishing hat to work those two days. The old timers gave me a dirty eye, and I was never assigned to the cruiser again. [[I didn't much care, all they did was park and drink coffee.)
Snopes disagrees: Hat Trick.
The view is from the east side of Woodward just south of old Campus Martius. It appears to have been taken from a wagon [[note the horse's ears in the extreme foreground) parked next to the sidewalk. The old Merrill Fountain would have been to the photographer's right. Because of the reconfiguration of Campus Martius in 2003-4 this location would be in the middle of the street today.
The well-remembered B. Siegel building is visible on the left, at the corner of Woodward and State. A few other buildings that are still standing today [[although very altered in some cases) can be seen on the west side of Woodward. Most prominently the Elliott Building in the sunshine at the corner of Grand River [[with the large rounded windows on the top floor). And way back in the distance, just past Grand Circus Park, one of Detroit's then famous "moonlight" lighting towers can be seen looming over the scene.
From the sun and the people's clothing it looks a fall or spring day. I might question the year assigned as a little late, since there appear to be no automobiles at all in the shot [[or is that one parked at the curb on the left, just past the streetcar?). As someone pointed out on the Shorpy site, this may be one of the last shots of a car-less Detroit.
Last edited by EastsideAl; February-07-17 at 10:51 AM.
I don't understand why we don't build beautiful buildings anymore, why is our current society so pathetic?
Horrible time to be alive in the US right now.
OMG! I love these photos SO MUCH! I wish I lived in Detroit back then...as a man, of course. Couldn't tolerate the whale-bone corsets! Thank you, Ray and thank you Shorpy!
Happily surprised to see a pre-Great Migration African-American in this view. Just about 1 percent of the population at this time.
Yes, that roughly tracks with 1.2 to 1.4 percent. The percentage actually went down during the flood of European immigration and the growth of the nascent auto industry in the '00s. The Great Migration begins in earnest with the First World War.
In any event, I sometimes hear African-Americans disdain these views of old Detroit, because they don't see "anybody who looks like me." So it's kind of nice to see this detail "filling out the picture," so to speak.
I enjoy viewing the old pictures of Detroit. Yes, I do scan the images to see if there any African Americans.
Of course, you know that there were African-American freemen in Detroit during the British occupation, that is, at the time of the War of 1812. I'm sorry but no photographs survive.
Great photo, but I'm not a fan of the SHORPY watermark blasted across it. Did he have to do that, it's not like it's his photo.
Well, it's his web site, and I'm grateful for his efforts in posting these historic photos. If you want the original, you can always go to the Library of Congress.
Another great Shorpy picture of our town. This time of the Monroe block, old City Hall, and other long-gone buildings. I think the date on this is also a couple of years late, from the evidence of the businesses on Monroe along with the complete lack of cars.
http://www.shorpy.com/node/21699
The watermark is across the entire photo, albeit faint. I hadn't noticed it before and now it's kind of annoying.
Where? If this were true, wouldn't it be on all Shorpy-marked photos? If so, where is it on this one other than in the corner?http://www.shorpy.com/node/21698?size=_original#caption
Where? If this were true, wouldn't it be on all Shorpy-marked photos? If so, where is it on this one other than in the corner?http://www.shorpy.com/node/21698?size=_original#caption
I see two parts of the water mark just left of the ramp that goes down to the water on the right side of the photo. It's on the water just above the last boat on the dock.
Last edited by Farwell; February-11-17 at 07:26 PM.
Dave puts the Shorpy watermark on each photo, as a way to show where the photo came from. Although many of the photos start at the LoC, the Shorpy folks 'adjust, restore and rework' the photos to clear them up. The process is described in the left column near the bottom of the site, under 'About the photos'. They've had people resell the restored photo as their own. Thus they watermark, often in odd or unexpected places.Where? If this were true, wouldn't it be on all Shorpy-marked photos? If so, where is it on this one other than in the corner?http://www.shorpy.com/node/21698?size=_original#caption
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