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The Free Press Building

April 16, 2010 in History | 2 comments

I’m not really the kind of Detroit kid that does a lot of scrambling around in old buildings, for better or worse, and not for lack of trying — it was pretty much my greatest dream (besides greatness itself) when I was seventeen. Since then I’ve done a lot of personal tail-chasing about Detroit’s ruins. Ultimately I’ve accepted the mesmerizing reality of places like Michigan Central and the Packard Plant, even though I still have a (sometimes kind of nasty and spiteful) knee-jerk reaction to the national fixation on the city’s decay.

Last weekend, with the team from Single Barrel (and with permission — because I am a nervous person like that), I “did my first building” — the gorgeous Albert Kahn-designed limestone Free Press Building at 321 W. Lafayette. With its 14-story central tower, beautiful carvings and reliefs and many of its elegant mid-century interiors intact — not to mention the imposing weight of its history as home of the Detroit Free Press for 75 years — the Freep is a stunner, and in relatively good condition. It’s been vacant since 1998.

I could hammer out a bunch of facts about the Free Press Building, but I’d rather you just read more about the history of this incredible place (and other incredible places) at Buildings of Detroit. Meanwhile, here are some photos.

Bas relief detail of the archway over the front door. You can’t see the seahorse in this photo. The seahorse is pretty great.

The first-floor Galley cafe.

Buffalo Soldiers.

Halfway to the top, gaping at the spot where the Lafayette used to be.

I like that you can see where the original lettering was painted over on this pretty (and locked) Diebold safe.

A lot of the building’s office doors still look like this. Also: they’re heavy.

The jaw-dropping office of Free Press owner E.D. Stair.

The unreal view from the roof.

The magnificent river.

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Lazy Monday flu-ridden round-up

January 25, 2010 in Culture, metro Detroit | No comments

Besides feeling swamped with projects, I’m terrified that I’m coming down with some kind of flu, so here are a few items to keep you busy in the event that I become bedridden or shackled to my (other, metaphorical, paid-gig) desk this week.

Katie Barkel makes neat videos

The MetroTimes music department was kind enough to have me back last week for a feature profile about a precocious lady filmmaker who loves “little kids shredding and old bikers smoking and throwing bottles at each other at the bar.” You can read about her here. I had a really great time working on this; it was the rare story that didn’t make me wonder, “Why didn’t I get a degree in something vocational, like ballroom dancing?”

I also really enjoyed this sweet and funny story about Leroy Haskins by Detroitblogger John, but then again, I am a total sucker for local eccentrics.

We went to the DIA

DIA 010

We are contented little birds in the tree of DIA membership, but as a long-time museum-goer and museum-lover and former museum-employee, I feel like I sometimes hit a plateau with certain collections, where I kind of feel like, “well, I’ve seen all of my favorites 100,000 times, and then there’s all that other stuff there that doesn’t excite me as much.” It’s like round two of the average visitor’s “What do I even do here? Where to start?” dilemma.

This weekend we broke our stride and just ambled around like kids at the zoo, nudging each other and whispering “look at that thing!” and “that guy’s face is blue!” and “wow, this stuff is old!”

DIA 012

We also remembered to go up to the third floor, which is way bigger than either of us ever remember. Usually we just visit the Rembrandt and call it a day. But there’s so much (!!!) more up there, like this room that’s reconstructed to look like an 18th-century French parlor, and when you press a button, it fills up with ambient noise — the strum of a harp, teacups, the clock ticking — and loads of other French decorative artworks and a room full of “fainting lady” paintings. We had a lot of fun, and not just in an intellectually stimulating way. We relaxed and enjoyed ourselves and kidded around. Sometimes art museums are great for that. I also enjoy taking bad, shaky pictures in them.

Also: the exhibition of WPA prints from the 1930s is striking and substantial.

Cocktails

I’m glad Model D is back on a weekly publishing schedule.  This feature about local signature cocktails is a little bit history, but mostly booze. The way I like it.

Tumbling down

Buildings of Detroit is doggedly covering the Lafayette Building demolition (and risking lung disease and dodging falling debris). Citizen journalism at its brave best.

American History Reading Room

The fiance and I got in some dumb argument about the Mexican-American war, or something, then realized that we’ve both forgotten substantial portions of our U.S. History education. Plus, that stuff was kind of boring when I was a teenager and did not understand or respect, you know, time.

We’re thinking about putting together a casual (albeit terrifically geeky) American History book salon to get up to speed. How should we carve out a curriculum? Should we take it chronologically, or thematically? One major event at a time, or through smaller, more regional perspectives? Or through an interpretive lens, like agriculture, or a specific industry, or art?

And what are some contemporary, engaging must-reads?

So, that’s all I’ve got. What have you got? Hopefully not the flu.

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Photographs from the Detroit Publishing Company

January 6, 2010 in History | No comments

Have you ever seen those old postcards — I tend to find them crammed in shoeboxes at antique stores — with luridly hued landscapes or blush-tinted street scenes and historical landmarks — photographs that almost look like rigid little paintings?

amsterdam

Dam Square, Amsterdam. Detroit Publishing Company, c. 1900

There’s a good chance they were made in Detroit.

In 1896, The Detroit Publishing Company acquired the exclusive American rights to PHOTOCHROM (uh, caps lock emphasis mine, because it is my new favorite name of a thing), a Swiss-patented process for making color lithographs from black-and-white photo negatives. Before PHOTOCHROM, photographs were colored by hand; color lithography was faster and produced more consistent results than hand-coloring or early color film. And it was so much sexier than black and white!

In a stroke of great serendipity for the partners of the Detroit Publishing Company, Congress passed the Private Mailing Card Act in 1898, which allowed private publishers to produce their own postcards. They were so cheap and so beautiful, and business boomed for the Detroit Publishing Company, which sent its photographers and dealers around the world by rail and sea to take photographs and buy negatives from other photographers willing to sell their wares.

niagra in winter

Niagra in Winter, American Falls, New York. Detroit Publishing Company, c. 1906

Photography, of course, was revolutionary, but I’d never really thought of postcards as a milestone in publishing until working on this post. It makes so much sense, though: a penny or two, and you’ve got a tiny — but resplendent — work of art in your hands. Photography was the window on the world; the postcard brought the world to your mailbox.

atlantic city

Looping the Loop, Atlantic City. Detroit Publishing Company, c. 1901.

Because I still haven’t bought a decent pair of winter boots, and because I don’t really like going outside in the cold, I spent a few hours in a substantive virtual exhibition on the Detroit Publishing Company presented by The Henry Ford. It’s a little dated as digital exhibitions go, but it’s still a delightful and comprehensive introduction to the history of the business, and naturally it’s full of more than a hundred great photographs and lithographs of street life, nature, architecture, transportation and pretty things from all over the world at the turn of the 20th century.

moonlight constantinople

Moonlight Over Constantinople, Turkey. Detroit Publishing Company, c. 1905

Most of the Detroit Publishing Company’s original negatives belong to the Library of Congress (which also maintains a DPC digital collection, if you have yet more time, nowhere in particular to be, and become infatuated with these works the way I did this week). The Henry Ford retains tens of thousands of DPC prints and postcards. And the fabulously redesigned Buildings of Detroit has a nice gallery of vintage postcards, sent from Detroit, that includes some great Detroit Publishing Company pieces.

In fact, I thought to myself whilst compiling this post, what about that BoD.com postcard I just bought from City Bird?

Sure enough:

macomb postcard

That’s General Alexander Macomb on Washington Boulevard, by the way. I bought it to remember how much I love General Alexander Macomb, and this statue of General Alexander Macomb, but now, quite surprisingly, it’s a remembrance of another really stunning slice of city history that I didn’t even know about until this week.

So many lizards under so many unsuspecting stones. I tell you.

winter canfield avenue

Winter Morning – Corner of Canfield and Second, Detroit. Detroit Publishing Company, c. 1905

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