Street Name Origins

[grumpyoldlady]

Here is a link I found that tells the origins of EARLY Detroit street names. There's loads more info than just street names on this site. Worth a look for just about everyone here I'd think. This may have been covered or posted previously, and if so I apologize for the duplication.

http://www.geocities.com/histmich/streetname.html

[izzyindetroit]

"Atwater; name for Reuben Attwater, Secretary of Michigan Territory; 1828."

Hmm... I always assumed it was because it is at the water.

[jcole]

Here is a link I found that tells the origins of EARLY Detroit street names. This may have been covered or posted previously, and if so I apologize for the duplication.

http://www.geocities.com/histmich/streetname.html

That's funny, GOL, I found the exact same link today, and was going to post it myself.

[dtowncitylover]

I'm glad you started this thread, because I am looking for a street in Royal Oak. I have a 1943 version of Sauer's Street Guide and Pocket Dictionary of Detroit. In the back there are DSR streetcar and bus line descriptions, one of which includes a weird busline that meanders itself through Royal Oak. The one street I am looking for is it's terminus or start, depending on which way you go. The street is: OAKWOOD ST. I Google mapped it, but the nearest Oakwood St. is in Oak Park. Perhaps it is called something new today. Can anyone help me? Or point me in the right direction?

The bus line description is:
Eastbound: From Maplewood and Northwood, via Northwood to 12 Mile, to Maple, to Catalpa, to Washington, to Fourth, to Gainsboro, to Gardenia, to Ferris, to OAKWOOD.
Westbound: Via OAKWOOD to Altadena, to Gardenia, to Gainsboro, to Fourth, to Washington, to Catalpa [[where DSR Woodward streetcar line would turn around), to Maple, to 12 Mile, to Maplewood, to Northwood.

-From Sauer's Street Guide and Pocket Dictionary of Detroit copyright 1943 by Sauer Bros.

[EastsideAl]

Oakwood was an old name for the eastern portion of 12 Mile in Royal Oak.

[EastsideAl]

"Atwater; name for Reuben Attwater, Secretary of Michigan Territory; 1828."

Hmm... I always assumed it was because it is at the water.

Ol' Judge Woodward was something of a punster it seems.

http://apps.detnews.com/apps/history/index.php?id=205

[dtowncitylover]

Oakwood was an old name for the eastern portion of 12 Mile in Royal Oak.

Wow! Really!? Thank you for the quick response!

[Mikeg]

Silas Farmer's "The History of Detroit and Michigan" [[written in 1884) contains a chapter on "Street Names and their Origin - Changes in Names" which begins on page 937 and can be read beginning here.

[Mikeg]

A reflection on the importance and historical significance of street names - from a report written by Silas Farmer in 1882 to the Detroit Common Council [source]:

"With a genealogy dating from the dawning of the sixteenth century, we would do well to give special heed to our historic past, and strive to preserve its memories in our street names as well as in our story. Street names approach immortality. Governments change, political parties die, officials and constituents pass into oblivion, buildings are burned, pavements uprooted, but well-chosen street names usually live as long as a city stands. A street name is more valuable and a more perpetual memorial than a monument of bronze or granite. They may be destroyed or defaced, but street names live though a city is burned. Everything tends to perpetuate and preserve them - land titles, business notices, social facts, city records, and in fact almost all the details of municipal government unite to fasten them in the memory and hand them down to the future. There are no other names in connection with the life of a city that are so frequently used as the names of its streets; and no other names are so frequently thought of and talked of by both residents and strangers. We are compelled to know and memorize them, and everything combines to repeat and reiterate them. As an instrumentality for preserving the remembrance of individuals and facts, they have no equal."

[Gsgeorge]

I guess MonCon didn't get Farmer's message when she renamed Washington Boulevard after her "husband". Or maybe she did, but she dismissed it because Farmer is an anglo. Can't trust people who don't "look like" you anyway, right? This guy Farmer probably wants street names to stay the same so the anglo-sounding thoroughfares can be a kind of conduit for the continued opression of the Black Man.

[Retroit]

^ Some of us have been hanging around with blksoul_x a little too much.

[rb336]

"Helen Ave; named after the daughter of G. V. N. Lothrop; 1885.
Hunt; named for second Mayor of Detroit, Henry Jackson Hunt; 1883"

just sayin...

[gnome]

Great link MikeG. ... took a quick peek and discovered we had a street named Dred after Dred Scott. Checked googlemaps, and no such street currently exists. I wonder where it was located.

[EastsideAl]

I guess MonCon didn't get Farmer's message when she renamed Washington Boulevard after her "husband". Or maybe she did, but she dismissed it because Farmer is an anglo. Can't trust people who don't "look like" you anyway, right? This guy Farmer probably wants street names to stay the same so the anglo-sounding thoroughfares can be a kind of conduit for the continued opression of the Black Man.

I have no love for Monica at all, but this is really a non-issue, since it's only the kind of honorary "second name" BS that cities do all the time to honor local people. NYC has literally hundreds of these all over the city. The only real objection I can see is the one that Sheila Cockrel had to the entire concept [[and cost) of second names.

Having said that, I would not be against fully re-naming a somewhat less prominent street after John Conyers. He has been at least as prominent and important to the history of this city, and in many cases more so, than a lot of the people for whom our streets are currently named.

[EastsideAl]

Oakwood was an old name for the eastern portion of 12 Mile in Royal Oak.

Wow! Really!? Thank you for the quick response!

Yes, it was. It shows on maps of the area into the 1920s as the name of the street in the area of the "triangle" intersection of Main, Crooks, and Rochester Rd.. Although I'm rather surprised to see it used as late as 1943, by which time maps that I've seen use "Twelve Mile Rd." Maybe it was just a holdover in that route description from an earlier time. Also, given the routing description, I assume that the "Maple" used there was an old name for some north-south street now in Berkley, and not current-day Maple Rd.

[dtowncitylover]

Yes, it was. It shows on maps of the area into the 1920s as the name of the street in the area of the "triangle" intersection of Main, Crooks, and Rochester Rd.. Although I'm rather surprised to see it used as late as 1943, by which time maps that I've seen use "Twelve Mile Rd." Maybe it was just a holdover in that route description from an earlier time. Also, given the routing description, I assume that the "Maple" used there was an old name for some north-south street now in Berkley, and not current-day Maple Rd.

This Maple St. is off of Catalpa in Royal Oak.

[Stosh]

Beware the evil street-naming suburbanites! From Farmer's book:

The suburban duplication of the street names oÃ[ Detroit is also a growing evil for which there is no excuse or necessity. The city cannot control the naming of streets in the adjoining townships, but such legislation should be secured as would prevent any suburban street, not in line with a city street, from bring called by the same name. Sooner or later, large portions of Hamtramck and Springwells will be attached to the city, and the number of duplicate street names will be greatly increased, unless the evil is remedied.

[Django]

Ive always wondered how Lucky Place got its name. Its a short street off the south side of 94 service drive between Mt Elliot and Grand Blvd.

[Detroitej72]

Ive always wondered how Lucky Place got its name. Its a short street off the south side of 94 service drive between Mt Elliot and Grand Blvd.

I read in the book "Poletown: A Community Betrayed", that it was given the name to recognize the struggle of the Poletown neighborhood to keep their homes.

[ronaldj]

In my understanding, Lucky Place was named in honor of the Chene Market at which many winning lottery tickets were purchased.

[Hamtragedy]

Stosh, a great example of that is Sobieski St in Hamtramck which runs NS and Sobieski St in Detroit, which is literally 500 feet away and runs EW

[faygoredpop]

Great link MikeG. ... took a quick peek and discovered we had a street named Dred after Dred Scott. Checked googlemaps, and no such street currently exists. I wonder where it was located.

I found a map from 1889 and it shows that Dred was McGraw. On the map it shows a listing for the streets and it shows Dred and it states "see McGraw Ave."

I've downloaded the maps, there were 4 pages that I got off of Footnote.com, they have some old city directories and some have the old maps of Detroit, hopefully they come out so you can see it.

[Prodigal_Son]

Faygo, are there any bigger versions of those maps we can see? They're fascinating.

[Mikeg]

1889 Detroit Street Map - west of Woodward [[2.7 MB)

1889 Detroit Street Map - east of Woodward [[2.7 MB)

1889 Detroit Street Guide Index - A to J [[0.6 MB)

1889 Detroit Street Guide Index - J to Z [[0.6 MB)

[karl jr.]

Some time ago in the old forum someone posted a link to an old map of Detroit that showed the location of the exposition that was held in late 1800's near the zug island area. Does anyone know the link to that map?