Packard Plant Questions

[georgem]

So I found out earlier this year, that my Mom worked at the Packard Plant for a short time. Early 1940's, Merlin production. Since then, I've been researching the plant, mostly through the various websites and Youtube. However, there are a couple of buildings, that I'm confused about..... 1) On the NORTH side of East Grand Blvd., just west of the r.r. tracks, there is a 4 story building.This is the one with the steel/concrete walkway over the tracks. Did the Packard Co. use this building? The reason I ask, is because it looks like the overhead walkway connected up with the 4 story buildings on Packard property. The ones that were torn down, in the late 1990's. 2).On the North end of the Packard plant, along Concord St., is a 4 story addition. This was built in the early 40's. Using Google Maps,this building is in really nice shape. The roof looks to be well maintained, the windows are bricked over, and the parking lot is in nice shape. Does anyone know what this building is being used for?

[MikeM]

Is this the second building you are asking about?

http://tinyurl.com/23jbdnk

I know it was built for aircraft engine production and is probably where your mother worked. Don't know what its current use is.

[georgem]

Yup. That's the one.

[Blue]

this is an article about how bankrupt Detroit is.
Somewhere in there you will find a detailed section about that building.
http://www.businessinsider.com/detro...ruptcy-2010-12

[Django]

It seemed there was some business in that building around two years ago but no more. Last time I was spending time at the Packard a dog was left to guard that parking lot which is fenced in from the rest of the Packard. Someone had also knocked a hole in the old Packard building inner wall [[where the parking lot ramp is)that butts up against your building and a ladder was lowered in. I was tempted to explore down the ladder but my gut said no. I havent been there in a while so Im not sure whats been going on other than that in the past six months or so. Im curious too what that business was.

[Whitehouse]

Still looking quite decent. The Google streetview pictures are not dated though.

[georgem]

Django,that overhead walkway is pretty massive. Is it wide/ tall enough for cars or towmotors to have gone from building to building?

[Wingnatic]

Years ago I worked in a building along the I-94 service drive around Chene , Mt. Elliot , heck I forgot now . It used to house Stone Container Corp . and latter Lambeer Packaging [[Bill ) When I worked there in the back of one corner of the building were two steel doors [[padlocked) wide enough to drive cars through and the floor to the steel doors had a slight decline leading to the steel doors , kind of like an inside dock . If someone were to get through the doors you'd probably be underneath the RR tracks right away . So it must have been a tunnel . A supervisor at the time said the building used to be a Packard Plant . I have no idea if this is true , but if someone could find out the address of the old Stone Container/Lambeer Packaging building . I haven't been by that area for a long time so I have no idea if the building is still there .

[MikeM]

The buildings on the west side of the tracks once were the Krit Motor Car Company, which went bankrupt in 1915. Packard then took over the complex. I don't know how they used them or when the overhead was built. There are a couple of Packard guys on the forum; once they find this thread they should have some answers for you.

[Packman41]

To Georgem: Thanks for asking this question because my mother and her two best friends [[my “aunts”) worked at Packard during WWII and I always wondered what building they worked in. So your question got me started on a search.

I had to check with our Packard Club resident expert and he gave me the following

Your Building #1
Packard knew this as Building #82 and it was built in 1929 for the production of the DR-980 diesel radial aircraft engine. Packard made only 94 of these engines and it was the first diesel engine certified for flight . As a side note: in 1931, a Bellanca CH-300 fitted with a DR-980 set a record for staying aloft for 84 hours and 32 minutes without being refueled. This record was not broken until 55 years later by the Rutan Voyager.

In post #8 MikeM says it was used as a Krit Motor Car Company building in 1913. I don’t know about that. What is known is that Packard built Building #82 in 1929. They would have torn down any pre-existing structures, if any. Someone with access to those city/building use maps could check this out. It would be good to know.

Your Building #2
Packard knew this as Building #22 and it was built in 1940 for the production of the Rolls Royce Designed Merlin engine. The photo that MikeM shows in post #2 is the correct building.

The photo is looking in a southwesterly direction. Concord runs south along the left and Harper Road [[before I-94 was built) is in the foreground. To the right [[west) you can barely see the streetcar tracks in the middle of the street. Anyway, the 4-story portion of the building was used for component assembly and the 1-story portion of the building [[to the right/west) was for final assembly and testing. This part of the building was always very noisy as the engines were started and run-in.

As a side note: Packard made several changes to the Rolls Royce design that [[1) increased horsepower from 1030HP to 1520HP [[2) improved durability and [[3) sped up manufacturing time from a R-R hand built engine to an engine that was mass produced on an assembly line.

After the war Building #22 was used as an office building for styling and engineering and became the “last days in the bunker” for the executives when Packard moved out of Detroit in 1956.

Georgem: You should be proud that your mother contributed to the Arsenal of the Democracy.

[MikeM]

In post #8 MikeM says it was used as a Krit Motor Car Company building in 1913. I don’t know about that. What is known is that Packard built Building #82 in 1929. They would have torn down any pre-existing structures, if any. Someone with access to those city/building use maps could check this out. It would be good to know.

A Sanborn map from 1915 shows the handful of buildings west of the tracks as "formerly Krit Motor Car Co.", with the northern most listed as "occupied by Packard". However, the building that Whitehouse posted a picture of [[#82) was not yet built and wasn't a Krit building. Thanks for the info about the diesel production there; another forumer was looking for the location of a Kahn-designed diesel aircraft engine plant built for Packard, but didn't know that it was part of the Packard complex.

The Sanborn maps also show that the location of building #22 as the site of a test track.

What about the building Stone Container occupied, west of building #22, across the tracks? Was this part of the Packard complex? Part of the Merlin production facilities?

[Toolbox]

Go find a January 2006 copy of Hemmings Classic Car, it has the final Detroit Goes to War article. This details Packards contribution to the war effort and how they took a hand built Rolls engine with a high failure rate and turned it into a mass produced engine that had truly interchangable parts. There are factory pictures and layouts relating to war production.

[Packman41]

To MikeM:

A call to my expert was needed.

Yes, Krit owned the land west of the RR tracks and west to Mt. Elliot St. from 1909 to 1916. Packard bought all that land from Krit in two parcel for future expansion. He confirmed that no Krit building was in place when Building #82 was constructed in 1929.

Yes, before the Packard Proving Grounds were built in 1928-9 in Utica [[Shelby Twp.) the test track was located where Building #22 is today.

Yes, the Stone Container Building was part of the Packard Plant, but my expert/friend cannot recall it as part of the Merlin assembly building.

This expert MAY be in town in March and I will check with him further.

[mikefmich]

This thread is why I love this place.....amazing amount of information comes forth.

Packard touches me....my ma was born & raised on Medbury in the shadows of the plant, and my grandfather worked there a few years in the earlier days of the plant.

[brucek1958]

There were actually three buildings erected related to the production of the Merlin engines. All of these buildings have a red brick facade. The first two have been mentioned already. The first being the four story office building, with a one story section attached behind it, that runs along Concord and the E. Edsel Ford service drive. The second is behind the first, across the tracks. The third is at the very south end of the Packard complex and runs along both Concord and Bellevue roughly from E. Kirby to the corner at Frederick.

The one story building attached behind the office building was used for main assembly. The building on the other side of the tracks was used for tear-down, test and reassembly. This building and the main assembly building were indeed connected by a tunnel running under the tracks. The building at the south end was used for machining, heat treating and plating.

My Dad told me years ago that all of the Merlin buildings were sold off individually after Packard closed up in Detroit. I do not know if Packard or the subsequent of owner of Packard Properties sold them. In a related aside, the one story shed buildings beginning at the corner of E. Palmer and Bellevue were sold to the U.S. Equipment Co. who owned the Miss U. S. hydroplane. Sometimes, the hydroplane would be on display on Bellevue in front of their building.

Post Packard, the office and main assembly building were occupied by Essex Wire and subsequently a self-storage operation; the building behind it on the other side of the tracks was occupied by Stone Container and subsequently Laimbeer Packaging; the building at the south end had several occupants including, in the taller section Rolled Alloys, and Berger Electric and Duralastic in the shorter part. There may have been others too.

Interestingly, if one views the DTE Aerial photos beginning in 1949, it appears that an addition was made to the eventual second building [[Stone/Laimbeer), that ran along Harper up to the then intersection with Mt. Elliott. The addition along with part of the original building was torn down to accommodate the Ford Fwy. construction. This can be seen in the 1956 aerial.

I scanned into a pdf file a terrific article, with many pictures, from the December 1941 edition of The Architerural Forum. It has details about the construction and operation of the new buildings. If anyone is interested, I can email it.

[Django]

Django,that overhead walkway is pretty massive. Is it wide/ tall enough for cars or towmotors to have gone from building to building?

Most def. Seems that the Eastern half of the walkway was removed years ago though.

Are you familiar with the other walkway between the two Packard buildings South of Grand Blvd that is now a pile of broken concrete blocking the road? Ive told this story before here but I love it so much Ill tell it again.

The walkway between the two buildings was pretty massive, definitely big enough for even small trucks to pass through from building to building. I remember eyeballing the huge I beams which were in an X formation inside the walkway that held the whole structure up. They were the largest I beams in the entire plant and I should know. Anyway one day about two years ago the workers at the one and only business in the Packard heard a huge crash outside, like a train wreck. They went out to find the entire walkway lying in the street in a cloud of dust, the whole thing felled at once. Out of the dust two scrappers emerged badly shaken and scrambling to get away. They had cut the I beams from inside the walkway while they were in it, kind of like cutting the tree limb your sitting on. Lucky for the scrappers the walls and ceiling didnt also come down on top of them. Two very lucky dudes. The concrete that did come down is massive, it still sits there and is about three foot thick.
I love that story.

[georgem]

WOW! I just wanted to thank everyone, for all the information you provided. I am no longer confused about this subject. Wasn't this more fun than going outside, and shoveling snow?

[Axle]

Using Google Maps,this building is in really nice shape. The roof looks to be well maintained, the windows are bricked over, and the parking lot is in nice shape. Does anyone know what this building is being used for?

Seems somebody lives in some part of the Packard plant, from; http://www.detroitblog.org/?p=1949

Hill’s home is the Packard Plant, the infamous, 35-acre auto factory where production ended half a century ago. He wound up living here after losing a house to a loan he couldn’t repay. “I didn’t even need to get a loan,” he says, ruefully. “I don’t know why I got it. But after that everything started sliding away from me.” He’s not a squatter, though. The electricity and water here is paid for each month. He owns the space he lives in. And this is his official, listed address.

A few years ago, a friend with a warehouse at the decaying plant hired him to look after it, and before long Hill moved into one of the little rooms in back. Now it’s his."

Alex.

[Django]

Ive known Al for years, really a kind man.
If someone needs a car repaired I recommended Al.

Thanks for the tip on the MT article, Id never seen that before.