Conner Creek Neighborhood

[313WX]

In short, my question is what happened to it?

The area I'm foscusing on specifically is what was the neighborhood south of Jefferson, west of the Conner Creek Pumping Station [[also west of where the Chrysler-Plymouth plant was) and east of the Jefferson Village Shopping Center.

Some of the blocks were Glover, Lycaste, Hart, Terminal and Hillger. The cross streets IIRC were Edilie, Lysette and Freud.

Like most of Detroit's neighborhood at the time it was vibrant and densely populated with plenty of retail establishments lined up along Jefferson [[the only notable one I know of was a Burger King at the corner of Hillger and Jefferson). Now unfortunately if you took a drive around this area you wouldn't have ever known hundreds of people used to call that area home.

Now I've heard vague stories about the demise of that area, and the stories I've heard are similar to the demise of the St. Cyril neighborhood. I was told in the 1970s there were plans in the works to build some type of industrial park of warehouse in that area, and some time around 1980 when the plans were supposedly finalized the area and its residents were cleared out. In anticipation of the newly built plant the neighborhood's infrastructure was ripped up. But unfortunately just like the land over in the St. Cyril area the land in the St. Jean/Jefferson area is reverting back to nature as apparently whatever big plans were supposed to happen in this area fell through.

But what I would like to know is what's the story behind this long gone neighborhood? Did anyone on DYes live or grow up in that neighborhood? If so, do you have any experiences you would like to share? Most importantly, what were the finer details behind that plant the city had for the neighborhood?

[sumas]

Last I looked I know 10 folk that live there. Amend that 14. Home to my favorite bar. Five active area organizations and home to Riverbend's Spartan affliate, [[love that store). Four Riverfront parks, a Krishna temple and some very bad development of prime riverfront property. Thanks Kwame! Canals and islands and a spectacular history.

Also some of the best people live there that I have ever met. Also mourn a few that have passed on. No I don't live there but would consider it an area of choice if I was looking

[One Shot]

Life after people...before your very eyes!

[Kathleen]

You're talking about the area between the Connor Creek Pumping Station and St. Jean, south of Jefferson, right?

I remember when the Chrysler Showroom was located there. And my dad's childhood home on St. Jean on the block just below Jefferson. The only familiar site nowadays there is the fire station at Hart.

[PaulGall]

David Eberhard was a pastor and community leader in that neighborhood and served on city council for two decades.


http://www.historictrinity.org/debiography.html

[Buy American]

That area was mainly filled with Southern people who worked at Chrysler back in the 50's, 60's and early 70's. There was an Edison Plant that had landmark smokestacks that have been torn down.

[PaulGall]

The smokestacks dominated the skyline in this neighborhood. They were known as the Seven Sisters, with two shorter little brothers. They were aligned in a north-south line pointing south to Canada. Pilots also used them as navigational aids pointing due north to City Airport, about five miles away.

And David Eberhard was southern too, a genuine Kentucky Colonel.

[SWMAP]

Pretty sure I saw David Eberhard walking on Gratiot near Trinity Lutheran just last week. Was I seeing a ghost?

[Hamtragedy]

My father was a minister at a Lutheran church on Charlevoix & St. Jean is the early 70's, and before that the Lutheran church on Lakeview and Vernor Hwy. The city was about to claim the entire tract E of St. Jean to Connor to eminent domain so Chrysler could build their new plant. The plant was to close Charlevoix, Vernor Hwy, and Kercheval, thereby choking off a large portion of the two communities the bulldozed community and those thoroughfares connected. We live with the desolation of those two remaining communities now.

Before you jump up and down, Lonnie Bates, and several other members of the congregation worked tirelessly to save that section of town from being bulldozed and from having those three roads closed, as families, including our own, [[Grampa lived on St. Jean from 1914-1929 and was a Jungaleer) that could walk to other family members' homes were now forced to walk miles out of their way or drive. Poletown eminent domain caused an eerily similar affect. What we're left with there is abandoned Chene St. and surrounding abandoned Poletown.


The area south of Jefferson east of St. Clair to St. Jean [[behind Keans and the Roostertail) was already seeing its share of blight but held on till the mid 80's. When the blight from the separted neighborhoods directly north took its toll that neighborhood became expendable. In the 90's the city bulldozed most of that neighborhood, put in new streets and street lights, and tried to parcel off that section. What you see now is the new neighborhood that never happened, with the exception of those handful of new homes from the early 2000s.

[Hamtragedy]

As for stories, I gleaned lots of them from my grandfather. His father was a motorman on the interurban starting in 1915 and would operate the line to Mt. Clemens and later Wyandotte. He called it the Hot Bath Line. They lived on St. Jean, near Kercheval, just down from Fairview Township, and recalls scrambling across the rooftops with his buddies as teenagers. He would ride the streetcars for free to the Concord? yard to take his dad his lunch. The firehouse on Lycaste still had a horse drawn hook and ladder.

Their house had boarders, up to six or eight of them, who lived in shifts, in the attic. They were only allowed to scale the ladder placed on the neighbors first story roof, to enter and exit the house because they all worked at Chrysler/Plymouth and came home filthy, boozed up, or in most cases, both. The commotion of a drunk falling off a ladder was common, everyone else had boarders as well. His mom changed the "pans" daily, and bathing was allowed regularly, which back then was once or twice a week.

One of the biggest complaints in the neighborhood was the "new" giant sign that Chrysler put up in the mid 20's. Apparently it was way brighter than anything else in that neighborhood and kept people up at night.

He and his friends would swim in the canals, over by Connor, or at the foot of Lenox. He said one kid dove in head first one day and they had to rescue him out of the muck, feet flailing. They would walk to Belle Isle, swim at Waterworks, take dates to Electric Park and even walk to the movies downtown. As a teenager, he got a job rowboating to Peche island, in the dark, usually from the foot of Alter. Rowboating back would put him right at about St. Jean with the current. He got paid for this job. He also drove to Peche Island in the wintertime, also in the dark. He claims he never lost a vehicle, but that there were lots of old sunken Model Ts on the western approach. This job also paid well. He graduated from Southeastern in 1928. He found his way to the whorehouses along the tracks in Hamtramck. A cheap cee-gar [[for a dime) gained admission. Dime-a-dance at the Vanity was also a favorite.

One of his first real jobs after high school was to pick up the gate receipts from the ballpark, throw them in the rumble seat, and drive them down to the Guardian Bank. He said they never thought twice about all that cash in the back of the car. He would then go back and hang out on Cherry St. and wait for Greenberg to hit one over the wall. He saw Ruth hit a couple as well. He worked at Packard [[selling bumpers out of the back door!) and at Continental. He said they had to wipe the orange stuff off the windshield every morning from the Budd Wheel plant.

When the Depression set in, he made a couple runs as a passenger in a small plane btw Detroit and Pittsburgh and Detroit and Milwaukee. These runs were also made in the dark. He thought he was done for that night in Pennsylvania when they landed in the fog. He bought a stake-truck and headed down to Arkansas. There was money to be made helping people move and hauling. He played baseball [[catcher) as a youngster in the many organized Detroit leagues, and as a young adult, in cornfields across America. He drank a lot. After losing his stake truck and all his money on booze, he rode the rails. Somewhere along the way, he was Sheriff in Tuscon [[wouldn't believe it but for the pictures).

Wound up back in Detroit after doing cleanup in the South Pacific a changed man, save for his discharge night, in the gutter in Chicago. Still had all his money though. Married and moved in with his first wife in '47 on Lemay, and later Lillibridge. He loved his Nash more than his wife, though, divorced, and married my grandmother at Reformation Lutheran Church on Lakeview & Vernor Hwy in 1955 where they lived on Lenox near Essex. He died, memory in tact, if not embellished, at 93 in 2004. Al Kaline, who won the batting title his rookie year, was his favorite.

[Kathleen]

Pretty sure I saw David Eberhard walking on Gratiot near Trinity Lutheran just last week. Was I seeing a ghost?

Not at all....Rev. David Eberhard is still going strong at Historic Trinity Lutheran!!
http://www.historictrinity.org/sundaybulletin.html

[Buy American]

As for stories, I gleaned lots of them from my grandfather. His father was a motorman on the interurban starting in 1915 and would operate the line to Mt. Clemens and later Wyandotte. He called it the Hot Bath Line. They lived on St. Jean, near Kercheval, just down from Fairview Township, and recalls scrambling across the rooftops with his buddies as teenagers. He would ride the streetcars for free to the Concord? yard to take his dad his lunch. The firehouse on Lycaste still had a horse drawn hook and ladder.

Their house had boarders, up to six or eight of them, who lived in shifts, in the attic. They were only allowed to scale the ladder placed on the neighbors first story roof, to enter and exit the house because they all worked at Chrysler/Plymouth and came home filthy, boozed up, or in most cases, both. The commotion of a drunk falling off a ladder was common, everyone else had boarders as well. His mom changed the "pans" daily, and bathing was allowed regularly, which back then was once or twice a week.

One of the biggest complaints in the neighborhood was the "new" giant sign that Chrysler put up in the mid 20's. Apparently it was way brighter than anything else in that neighborhood and kept people up at night.

He and his friends would swim in the canals, over by Connor, or at the foot of Lenox. He said one kid dove in head first one day and they had to rescue him out of the muck, feet flailing. They would walk to Belle Isle, swim at Waterworks, take dates to Electric Park and even walk to the movies downtown. As a teenager, he got a job rowboating to Peche island, in the dark, usually from the foot of Alter. Rowboating back would put him right at about St. Jean with the current. He got paid for this job. He also drove to Peche Island in the wintertime, also in the dark. He claims he never lost a vehicle, but that there were lots of old sunken Model Ts on the western approach. This job also paid well. He graduated from Southeastern in 1928. He found his way to the whorehouses along the tracks in Hamtramck. A cheap cee-gar [[for a dime) gained admission. Dime-a-dance at the Vanity was also a favorite.

One of his first real jobs after high school was to pick up the gate receipts from the ballpark, throw them in the rumble seat, and drive them down to the Guardian Bank. He said they never thought twice about all that cash in the back of the car. He would then go back and hang out on Cherry St. and wait for Greenberg to hit one over the wall. He saw Ruth hit a couple as well. He worked at Packard [[selling bumpers out of the back door!) and at Continental. He said they had to wipe the orange stuff off the windshield every morning from the Budd Wheel plant.

When the Depression set in, he made a couple runs as a passenger in a small plane btw Detroit and Pittsburgh and Detroit and Milwaukee. These runs were also made in the dark. He thought he was done for that night in Pennsylvania when they landed in the fog. He bought a stake-truck and headed down to Arkansas. There was money to be made helping people move and hauling. He played baseball [[catcher) as a youngster in the many organized Detroit leagues, and as a young adult, in cornfields across America. He drank a lot. After losing his stake truck and all his money on booze, he rode the rails. Somewhere along the way, he was Sheriff in Tuscon [[wouldn't believe it but for the pictures).

Wound up back in Detroit after doing cleanup in the South Pacific a changed man, save for his discharge night, in the gutter in Chicago. Still had all his money though. Married and moved in with his first wife in '47 on Lemay, and later Lillibridge. He loved his Nash more than his wife, though, divorced, and married my grandmother at Reformation Lutheran Church on Lakeview & Vernor Hwy in 1955 where they lived on Lenox near Essex. He died, memory in tact, if not embellished, at 93 in 2004. Al Kaline, who won the batting title his rookie year, was his favorite.

What a history your grandfather had and how wonderful it is that you were informed of all this before he passed away. I wish I had gleaned much more information from my grandparents before they died. My paternal grandparents lived on Lycaste and Vernor. That area back in the 40's and 50's was vibrant. Lots of poor people lived around there, but everyone looked out for everyone else. My other grandparents always had someone living with them. A cousin from down South, looking for work, a displaced relative down on their luck.

Conner Creek, Waterworks Park, Belle Isle, walking to the Booth Theatre on Jefferson, bowling at the Archway on Jefferson, Gallagher Pool and Ice rink on St. Jean, St. Rose School, Southeastern [[where all my family are alummi, including myself), Uniroyal...all that, brings back memories.

There were Southern roots there, mine were Tennessee and Arkansas.

Thanks for posting this Ham....it was a very interesting read.