Palm tree at E. Jefferson

[Ezri]

I was visiting E. Jefferson [[through google) to see what it looks like today. Memories started to come back... one of the is of some sort of palm tree that used to be in front of what I believe was a pink building [[hotel?). Am I hallucinating or my memory is right? Anyone has pictures of it?

[[Please excuse my rusty english... )

[Buy American]

Could it be the Bali Hi Motel?

[Ezri]

I'm not sure if it was the Bali Hi Motel...
I found the following website: http://waterwinterwonderland.com/motels.asp?min=A&max=E
There are some Hotel pics there [[the Bali Hi included) but I don't see the palm tree.

I remember that everytime I passed in front of it, I used to wonder how did it manage to survive! it didn't look too healthy but it had survived.... amazing!

[EastsideAl]

I think it was at the beautiful Balmar [[as in their ad, which ran for years in the Downtown Monitor and other similar publications "Egad, I wish I'd gone to the beautiful Balmar instead!") Motel near Jefferson & McDougall. I believe it was over their pool that was situated within sight of the traffic on Jefferson, and used to be lighted up at night. That property is now a Days Inn.

[Ezri]

Hi EastSideAl,

Thanks for the tip! I went looking for info on the Balmar Motel and found an old ad for an old postcard:

http://img109.imageshack.us/img109/7616/01temph.jpg

I don't see the palm tree but it may be that the picture is too old ... or maybe it was still too young? could be the thing we see on the lower right corner on the yard in front of the pool?
The banner in front of the motel rings a bell....

I also found an old add for the Balmar in a Gross Pointe Newspaper from 1972!
If you want to read it is on page 24:

http://digitize.gp.lib.mi.us/digitiz...1971-05-27.pdf

[[I like the part where it says "All color TV's" Sometimes we forget that once upnon a time... there used to be black an white tv's ... )

I think this is the ad you described! It starts by "Egad... "