Old City Hall demolition

[Michael Hojnacki]

1961

[Worldsgreatest]

People in the 60's were real idiots huh, like truly brain dead morons. It must have been all the leaded gasoline in the air.

[Michael Hojnacki]

Apparently, when lead was taken out of gasoline, crime dropped nationally. The theory was that the leaded gas made people crazy. This one is Miriani's fault. He hated that building and after prison, he moved out to the burbs. Amazing how one person can screw things up.

[Gistok]

From 1950-70 about 1/2 of all the finest movie palaces in the USA were destroyed because "people don't want to look at all that old stuff anymore".

Historic preservation didn't start being really popular until the 1970s... so we have to look at earlier demolitions [[such as the gloriously ornate NYC Pennsylvania Station in 1963) with a grain of salt. There just wasn't an interest in saving old buildings back then.

To give you an idea about how ambivalent people felt about historic demolitions... check out this video of the 1963 demolition of the 1929 built San Francisco Fox Theate. It is considered the greatest loss of any historic American theatre. [[Note: first 2 minutes talks about the theatre organ chambers, followed by the "demo celebration")....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8o90jvKRec

[Michael Hojnacki]

I watched that some years back and they celebrated it's demolition.

[Michael Hojnacki]

another box from 1874

[Worldsgreatest]

Didn't this demolition go all the way to the supreme court? They fought hard to keep the city hall.

[Michael Hojnacki]

That I don't know but Louis Miriani had the final decision and ordered it. There is an article on how he said "I literally fell out of my chair" when it came to preserving it and he talked about how "the plumbing was shot and it was an eyesore". At that time a poll was taken and a majority were in favor of saving it. In the 1940s it was power washed and people were complaining when seeing the original clean stone. They didn't like the mustard color to it. There is a bank in Hamtramck that has that same color just to give you an idea of how it looked. When Cobo was mayor he supported saving it. The sad thing is Miriani wanted it gone and after prison, he moved out to the burbs, he didn't stay in the city. Amazing how one person can screw things up.

[stasu1213]

Was the old City Hall was on the spot where Chase Bank is now or was on the spot where Kennedy Square once was? I figured that it was razed to make way for tall glistening building such as Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles were gaining. The attitude had carried into the 90s. The Monroe Block was illegaly razed in the 80s and some of the old Victorian homes in Brush Park were illegally razed in the 90s. It's all about money and elected officials having their palms greased by demolition contractors and developers.

[Michael Hojnacki]

Kennedy square. After its demolition, they had an underground parking garage there but that didn't last long. I believe Ernst & Young is on the lot now. if you look at the pic of people throwing rocks at it, to the left is the bank which was built around 1959. Until about 2006 it was an empty lot.

[Michael Hojnacki]

I just read it did go before the supreme court.

[Gistok]

I too lament its' loss... but it was not that large of a building. When I looked at an old Sanford map, I was surprised. It only had about 1/3 of the footprint size of the still standing Old County Building. But Old City Hall was a much older building.

[Michael Hojnacki]

The Beabien family was there when the lead box was opened and apparently there was a story that was passed down from generation to generation that if Old City Hall was ever demolished or the land was used for other than a municipal purpose, the land would revert back to the family and they were hoping that a letter was in there explaining this but nothing was found. And by the 1890s the mayor wanted it demolished for a newer building. For some time the basement was used as a morgue.

[Gistok]

In the 1890s a new City Hall would have been acceptable. That was just after the Columbian Exposition of Chicago [[1892-93) when the Beaux Arts civic architectural style was all the rage.

[Dexlin]

Kennedy square. After its demolition, they had an underground parking garage there but that didn't last long.

So, not only did the underground garage survive, it's still there. It's just a part of the building, now.

[Michael Hojnacki]

ahh I thought the city closed it around 69 or 70

[Michael Hojnacki]

Beaux Arts, perhaps they were thinking in that direction.

[EastsideAl]

Not everyone was happy with it going down

[[Love the belt)

But both newspapers editorialized in favor of tearing it down, and many stories appeared using such terms as "dilapidated", "hideous", "embarrassing", "victorian monstrosity", etc. The Common Council voted 5-4 in favor of getting rid of it, and soon the deed was done.

To be replaced by:

[[Rare shot with fountains running - mostly it was dry barren concrete)

[Michael Hojnacki]

The middle photo I've seen but I haven't seen the other two. Thanks for sharing. Sad how victorian architecture fell out of fashion in the big cities.

[Rochelle St.]

So where was all the rubble from the hall discarded?

[Ray1936]

I think most of it went on the south side of Belle Isle as a breakwater.

[Detroitnerd]

Somebody told me that the demolition began in the morning, and that motorists were driving downtown and saw the wreckers at work in great surprise. It had only been five years since the last streetcar ran down Woodward, which Detroiters still cherished and were largely sad to see gone.

It was a strange time in America. A building built 100 years earlier was seen by many leaders as hopelessly obsolete. I don't know that this would happen today. It would not be as easily done.

But Detroit still has a "model year" mentality about many things. It doesn't help that so many development and demolition deals are cooked up in secret, by groups that pay only lip service to the public. I am hopeful that the younger generation values the now-ancient charm of buildings designed before the advance of modernism, and will play a greater role in their stewardship.

I actually got to see the old statues that had been on City Hall. They lay in pieces, behind Fort Wayne in 2004. They've since been moved inside. Though Carl Nielbock has long offered a proposal for their public exhibition, no move seems to be made to show them. [[I think the reason they are reluctant to exhibit them is due to the damage they suffered during their ignominious "storage" at the fort.)

I remarked the other day that no city has disregarded its history like Detroit has -- no city that hasn't been conquered, that is.

[Bigb23]

It was a strange time in America. A building built 100 years earlier was seen by many leaders as hopelessly obsolete. I don't know that this would happen today. It would not be as easily done.

Unless the building is sports related, then they have a fairly short shelf life.
[[JLA - Palace - Silverdome, etc.)

[Michael Hojnacki]

Ray1936 yes the rubble did go to Bell Isle. I remember when I was a kid seeing rough cut stone that resembled stonework from a church and then later I realized it came from Old City Hall. I recall seeing a carving with a year on it that could have been a corner stone but I don't know if it came from Old City Hall or another building because I can't remember the year that was carved into it.

[Michael Hojnacki]

the article might mention it, but I thought I read somewhere or was told it they wanted to move the statues to Wayne State but obviously that has never happened.